{"id":334972,"date":"2025-12-08T13:31:29","date_gmt":"2025-12-08T13:31:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/334972\/"},"modified":"2025-12-08T13:31:29","modified_gmt":"2025-12-08T13:31:29","slug":"fallout-from-katoa-incident-sees-two-doctors-head-trainer-banned-for-two-years-nrl-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/334972\/","title":{"rendered":"Fallout from Katoa incident sees two doctors, head trainer banned for two years – NRL News"},"content":{"rendered":"

The head trainer and two doctors of the Tongan national team have been banned for two years for the incident that allowed star back-rower Eliesa Katoa<\/a> to play with repeated head knocks during the 2025 Pacific Championships<\/a>.<\/p>\n

While Katoa has been ruled out for the entire 2026 season – and possibly his career – the NRL<\/a> has handed down a breach notice to four individuals of the Tongan coaching staff who allowed him to take the field despite sustaining several head knocks in a limited time frame.<\/p>\n

The sanctions follow an NRL<\/a> investigation.<\/p>\n

Penalties from the NRL via official statement<\/p>\n

Head Doctor<\/p>\n

“A prohibition from being concerned, whether directly or indirectly, with any Club, Team or Player in the NRL<\/a> Competitions, Representative Competitions or any other competition conducted under the auspices of the NRL<\/a> or ARLC for a period of no less than 24 months.”<\/p>\n

Assistant Doctor<\/p>\n

“A prohibition from being concerned, whether directly or indirectly, with any Club, Team or Player in the NRL<\/a> Competitions, Representative Competitions or any other competition conducted under the auspices of the NRL<\/a> or ARLC for a period of no less than 24 months.”<\/p>\n

Orange Shirt Trainer (Head Trainer)<\/p>\n

“A prohibition from being concerned, whether directly or indirectly, with any Club, Team or Player in the NRL<\/a> Competitions, Representative Competitions or any other competition conducted under the auspices of the NRL<\/a> or ARLC for a period of 24 months.”<\/p>\n

Yellow Shirt Trainer<\/p>\n

“Additionally, the yellow shirt trainer (Medical Assistant) has been issued with a formal warning.”<\/p>\n

The four individuals listed above will also undergo further training under the NRL<\/a> rules and the NRL’s policy on possible head injuries and concussions.<\/p>\n

They also have five business days to respond to the breach notice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The head trainer and two doctors of the Tongan national team have been banned for two years for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":334973,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-334972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334972"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334972\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/334973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}