{"id":666077,"date":"2026-10-26T19:10:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-26T19:10:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/666077\/"},"modified":"2026-10-26T19:10:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-26T19:10:11","slug":"leinsters-tadhg-furlong-cited-for-alleged-incident-against-munsters-gavin-coombes-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/666077\/","title":{"rendered":"Leinster\u2019s Tadhg Furlong cited for alleged incident against Munster\u2019s Gavin Coombes \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tadhg Furlong<\/a> has been cited for an alleged incident that occurred in the 37th minute of Saturday\u2019s URC game between Leinster and Munster<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Leinster prop\u2019s citing follows a complaint by Munster number eight Gavin Coombes during the game that he had been grabbed in his groin area.<\/p>\n

It is likely that Furlong will face a disciplinary hearing this week.<\/p>\n

The match citing commission, Peter Ferguson of the IRFU, had a 48-hour window from the conclusion of Saturday\u2019s game to decide whether there were any grounds to cite any players.<\/p>\n

It is understood he spoke with players from both squads and having read the report of referee Andrew Brace and studied video footage, a URC statement at 2pm on Monday confirmed that Ferguson \u201chas made a complaint about an act of foul play by the Player (Tadhg Furlong No 3) against opponent Gavin Coombes (No 8).<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Player has been cited under Law 9.27 \u2013 A player must not do anything that is against the spirit of good sportsmanship including but not limited to grabbing, twisting or squeezing the genitals.<\/p>\n

\u201cArrangements for the disciplinary process are currently in progress and will be announced in due course.\u201d<\/p>\n

Furlong and the rest of the 37-man Ireland squad are in training camp ahead of the forthcoming Nations Championship and the likeliest date for a disciplinary hearing is probably this Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The incident occurred during a long passage of Leinster multiphase attacking in the 37th and 38th minutes, after which Brace called for a time off and informed both captains that he had asked for a review with his TMO Colin Stanley.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a big accusation. I don\u2019t know who it is but I\u2019m going to check it. Colin, I\u2019m coming to you. I\u2019ve an accusation of number eight red that he\u2019s been grabbed in the groin area so we just need to check if there\u2019s any foul play. If there\u2019s not then we\u2019ll refer it to a citing commissioner.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stanley asked him: \u201cDo we have a phase of play?\u201d<\/p>\n

Brace responded: \u201cIn that last ruck there he [Coombes] said.\u201d<\/p>\n

That is significant, for it transpires that the alleged incident happened at a ruck two or three phases earlier, not at the last ruck, which was what the officials were told to review.<\/p>\n

\"Munster'sMunster’s Gavin Coombes in action against Leinster. Photograph: Ben Brady\/Inpho <\/p>\n

The Munster captain Tadhg Beirne said to Brace: \u201cIt\u2019s a big accusation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, 100 per cent, that\u2019s why I\u2019m reviewing it,\u201d Brace said.<\/p>\n

Informed by Stanley that he could see no evidence to substantiate the allegation based on the camera angles he had been shown, Brace orders the game to restart, telling Beirne: \u201cTadhg, nothing clear mate. The citing commissioner will have to deal with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, it has since come to light that camera angles from a ruck two or three phases before \u201cthe last ruck\u201d have indicated there is at least a case to answer. It is also understood that Coombes fully stands by his allegation.<\/p>\n

Ironically, it was almost a year to the day since the Bulls\u2019 hooker Jan Hendrik-Wessels was handed a nine-week suspension for grabbing the testicles of Connacht\u2019s Josh Murphy during a URC game in October last year at the Dexcom Stadium. The match-citing commissioner that day in Galway was also Ferguson.<\/p>\n

Unlike last Saturday, when there had been little reaction on the pitch, Murphy immediately punched Wessells in response to the alleged groin grab, and the Connacht lock was sent off. That red card was subsequently overturned and the Springboks\u2019 hooker was cited and suspended for nine weeks on the balance of probabilities rather than video evidence, much to the annoyance of the Bulls, South African supporters and Rassie Erasmus. Wessels\u2019 ban was reduced by only one week following his appeal and he was ruled out of their end-of-year tour.<\/p>\n

The South African supporters and Erasmus et al will no doubt be monitoring this case closely and demanding similar punishment for Furlong, which would rule him out of the forthcoming Nations Championship northern series, including Ireland\u2019s game against the Springboks at the Aviva Stadium on November 21st.<\/p>\n

Were Furlong ruled out of the forthcoming Test window, Andy Farrell would need to supplement his remaining tightheads, Thomas Clarkson and Sam Illo, possibly with the latter\u2019s fellow Connacht man Finlay Bealham.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tadhg Furlong has been cited for an alleged incident that occurred in the 37th minute of Saturday\u2019s URC…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":666078,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[53655,61,60,11287,11897,112,69607],"class_list":["post-666077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-gavin-coombes","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-leinster-rugby","tag-munster-rugby","tag-sports","tag-tadhg-furlong"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666077","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=666077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/666077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/666078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=666077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=666077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=666077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}