Newcastle\u2019s Asu Kepaoa has been referred directly to the NSWRL judiciary for allegedly using a homophobic slur towards a rival player last week that led to him being sent off in a NSW Cup match.<\/p>\n
The NSWRL confirmed via a statement on Monday the Knights player would have to front the judiciary for the alleged slur directed towards Dragons winger Nathan Lawson. <\/p>\n
Kepaoa was sent off just before half-time of Friday\u2019s NSW Cup match against the Dragons. It\u2019s unclear what was said, but officials heard the comment and made the call to send him from the field.<\/p>\n
\u201cNewcastle Knights back-rower Asu Kepaoa has been referred to the NSWRL judiciary for an alleged homophobic slur in the 39th minute of The Knock-On Effect NSW Cup match against St George Illawarra Dragons at McDonald Jones Stadium, Newcastle, on Friday 19 June,\u201d a NSWRL spokesperson said. <\/p>\n
\u201cKepaoa has until midday tomorrow (Tuesday 23 June) to enter a plea with a NSWRL judiciary hearing scheduled for Wednesday night.\u201d<\/p>\n
Marcelo Montoya was suspended for four matches back in 2022 for an on-field homophobic slur during an NRL match.<\/p>\n
Kepaoa played 43 NRL games for the Wests Tigers and then moved to the Panthers where he was stuck in reserve grade before he signed a two-year deal to join the Knights in 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Newcastle\u2019s Asu Kepaoa has been referred directly to the NSWRL judiciary for allegedly using a homophobic slur towards…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":752469,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[360938,64,63,25994,7992,158,360937,85],"class_list":["post-752468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-asu-kepaoa","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-judiciary","tag-knights","tag-nrl","tag-nsw-cup","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752468","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=752468"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752468\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/752469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=752468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=752468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=752468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}