{"id":387471,"date":"2026-04-08T03:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T03:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/387471\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T03:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T03:48:12","slug":"sale-suffer-triple-blow-ahead-of-champions-cup-trip-to-face-leinster-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/387471\/","title":{"rendered":"Sale suffer triple blow ahead of Champions Cup trip to face Leinster \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sale Sharks have been dealt a triple blow in the build-up to their Champions Cup<\/a> quarter-final against Leinster<\/a> at the Aviva Stadium next Saturday (kick-off 5.30pm).<\/p>\n

In addition to season-ending injuries for loosehead prop Bevan Rodd and hooker Luke Cowan-Dickie, replacement hooker Nathan Jibulu has been suspended for six weeks. This follows an independent disciplinary hearing after Jibulu had been cited for allegedly biting the Harlequins replacement prop, Will Hobson, in the 69th minute of Sale\u2019s Round of 16 win at the Stoop last Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cJibulu accepted that he had committed an act of foul play that warranted a red card,\u201d according to a statement by tournament organisers EPCR, adding: \u201cThe committee upheld the citing complaint, finding that Jibulu had bitten an opponent and determined that the offending was at the low-end of World Rugby\u2019s sanctions and 12 weeks was selected as the appropriate entry point.<\/p>\n

\u201cTaking into account his guilty plea, timely expression of remorse, his young age and inexperience and his clear disciplinary record, the committee decided to reduce the sanction by the maximum of 50 per cent, before imposing a six-week suspension.<\/p>\n

Cowan-Dickie had finished off two lineout maul tries against Harlequins but went off with a broken forearm, while Rodd suffered a dislocated shoulder in the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that\u2019s probably their season over,\u201d said the Sale director of rugby Alex Sanderson, also ruling them out of England\u2019s summer Tests.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sale Sharks have been dealt a triple blow in the build-up to their Champions Cup quarter-final against Leinster…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":387472,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[32728,42,11287,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-387471","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-champions-cup","9":"tag-headlines","10":"tag-leinster-rugby","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-top-news","13":"tag-top-stories","14":"tag-topnews","15":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=387471"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387471\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/387472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=387471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=387471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=387471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}