Wests Tigers young gun Javon Andrews is one step closer to making his NRL debut after Latu Fainu copped a monster three-match ban at the judiciary on Tuesday night.
Andrews was named at halfback for the club’s game against Canberra on Saturday but won’t start after regular No.7 Adam Doueihi won his case earlier in the night.
But there’s every chance the junior Queensland Origin playmaker could come off the bench on the back of his impressive form in NSW Cup.
Andrews has been touted as the future of the club and would benefit greatly from some first grade experience in the coming weeks given Jarome Luai won’t be at the Tigers next year.
Fainu was hit with a grade three dangerous contact charge for a controversial tipping tackle on Bulldogs forward Leo Thompson that divided footy fans after an unconventional shoulder to the knee.
Defence counsel Nick Ghabar argued it was an ordinary legs tackle, that the contact wasn’t dangerous or careless and that it was an accidental series of events caused by Thompson.
NRL counsel Lachlan Gyles didn’t buy the argument and suggested the tackle was bordering on reckless, with the initial contact akin to hitting someone with a “blunt instrument”.
Fainu was sent to the sin bin for a tackle which was described as being “inherently dangerous” by Gyles.
“It was a horrendous and high risk situation that could have broken his neck,” he said, adding that Thompson could have easily suffered a catastrophic knee injury.
Fainu would have been banned for two matches if he’d taken the early guilty plea but will now miss his side’s next three games against the Raiders, Eels and Dragons.
The panel of Tony Puletua and Paul Simpkins unanimously found him guilty, but Ghabar then sought a downgrade in a bid to have the ban reduced by a game.
But Gyles tendered new evidence that showed Lainu had received two concerning act notices about this type of conduct which saw the panel stick with their ruling.
Earlier, the Tigers had a big win with star halfback Adam Doueihi free to play the Raiders after he had his high tackle charge downgraded.
Doueihi could have accepted a one-match ban for the grade two offence but sought a downgrade at Rugby League Central where David Fiifta was suspended in the first case of the evening.
The Lebanese international pleaded guilty and was supported by Tigers chief executive Shaun Mielekamp and club legend Pat Richards as Ghabar tried to convince the panel that his client should be free to play this weekend.
He risked a two-match ban if he was unsuccessful, but the panel unanimously agreed it was a grade one offence.
It’s a great result for the Tigers who are long odds to make the finals after dropping their past five matches but will at least have their first-choice halves with Doueihi to partner Luai.
“I love being out there with the boys,” Doueihi said after the hearing.
“I want to help turn our season around again. It’s a good opportunity to go down to Canberra this week. They’re on the back of a few wins so we’ll go there with an ambush mentality.”
Ghabar argued that the 54th-minute tackle on Bulldogs forward Harry Hayes only carried a “mild risk of injury” and that the contact was innocuous because it wasn’t penalised.
He was adamant that several collisions contributed to the deflection of bodies and pointed to a comparable from the opening round in Las Vegas that saw Braidon Burns cop a grade one charge for a high shot on Kalyn Ponga.
Gyles disputed the comparable because Doueihi made direct contact with the head and that this tackle had a moderate level of force, “exemplified by the player racing out of the defensive line”.
Gyles said the Tigers halfback didn’t have time to adjust his height because he rushed out of the line and that Hayes didn’t have the ability to defend himself.
“If a player comes out of the line with that level of force, they’ve got to get it right. Unfortunately, he didn’t get it right,” he said.
South Sydney’s finals hopes have taken another hit with Fifita banned for two matches.
It leaves them thin in the back row with Tallis Duncan (hamstring) and Cameron Murray (calf) ruled out of Friday’s game against the Storm, with Thomas Fletcher in the mix to replace Fifita on the edge.
Fifita received a grade two dangerous contact charge for an incident involving Raiders forward Hudson Young when the Rabbitohs forward kicked out during a tackle and hit the Blues star in the back of the head early in the second half.
The kick wasn’t penalised on the field but resulted in a charge that would have seen the former Maroons representative banned for a match if he had taken the early guilty plea.
Instead, Fifita pleaded guilty but sought a downgrade at Rugby League Central where the panel unanimously found him guilty.
Fifita was supported by South Sydney coach Wayne Bennett and football manager Jason Clark, with Ghabar serving as his defence counsel.
Ghabar argued that Young pushed himself up off the tackle which accentuated the situation and that there was no visible pause and separate move to kick.
He said there was “no conventional kicking action” because there was no planted foot, no deliberate action and no follow through, with no snap back of Young’s head.
Ghabar also pointed out that the referee and touch judge had a clear view of the incident but didn’t penalise it, and used a comparable grade one charge from 2024 when Dragons winger Tyrell Sloan lashed out and kicked Sam Walker in the head.
Gyles suggested there was no comparison given Sloan was held and was trying to free himself to play the ball which was a far more common case of carelessness.
He argued to the panel that there was an unreasonable risk of injury to Young, the level of carelessness was high and that there was no mitigation given the momentum of the tackle had stopped.
“It’s very hard to justify a movement that shows what you can see on that still. It has to be more than a low level of carelessness,” he said.