{"id":658367,"date":"2026-10-27T07:50:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-27T07:50:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/658367\/"},"modified":"2026-10-27T07:50:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-27T07:50:13","slug":"leinster-backing-tadhg-furlongs-good-character-over-alleged-groin-grabbing-incident-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/658367\/","title":{"rendered":"Leinster backing Tadhg Furlong\u2019s good character over alleged groin-grabbing incident \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Leinster<\/a> assistant coach Robin McBryde has backed Tadhg Furlong<\/a>\u2019s character after the Ireland prop was cited over an alleged groin-grabbing incident<\/a> involving Munster\u2019s Gavin Coombes during last Saturday\u2019s interprovincial derby at the Aviva Stadium.<\/p>\n

McBryde said the disciplinary process must take its course but expressed confidence in Furlong\u2019s record as Leinster began preparations for Friday\u2019s United Rugby Championship (URC) trip to Connacht.<\/p>\n

The 33-year-old tight head was cited over an incident in the 37th minute, when Coombes alleged his genitals had been grabbed. Referee Andrew Brace asked television match official Colin Stanley to review the footage, but no evidence of foul play was identified at the time.<\/p>\n

Citing commissioner Peter Ferguson lodged a complaint on Monday under Law 9.27, which prohibits conduct contrary to good sportsmanship, including grabbing, twisting or squeezing an opponent\u2019s genitals. A hearing date has yet to be announced.<\/p>\n

If the charge is upheld, Furlong could be suspended for Ireland\u2019s Nations Championship fixtures in November.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re playing guessing games if anybody wants to comment on it, other than Tadhg, really. Just let the process take its course,\u201d McBryde said after Leinster\u2019s training session at UCD.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019d like to think that the good character Tadhg has shown over all the years \u2013 to my knowledge, nothing like this has come his way. So, I\u2019d be confident in that. It is what it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Leinster forwards coach added: \u201cI know Tadhg. If I was to give him a character reference, I wouldn\u2019t hesitate. He\u2019s got no history of anything like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Gavin Coombes\u2019 allegation his testicles were grabbed against Leinster to be investigatedOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Asked whether he had sought a further review of the footage of the incident, McBryde said he preferred to focus on Connacht, who have been going well.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t chase it. The process is there. I\u2019ve got bigger fish to fry \u2013 we\u2019ve got Connacht coming on Friday,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Munster head coach Clayton McMillan backed Coombes after the match, saying he trusted his players would not make such an allegation lightly. Leinster head coach Leo Cullen initially said it looked as though Coombes \u201chad changed his mind halfway through that accusation\u201d, but later acknowledged the seriousness of the matter once the citing commissioner became involved.<\/p>\n

McBryde, meanwhile, underlined the importance of discipline to Leinster\u2019s ambitions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you haven\u2019t got discipline, you\u2019re not going to win anything or get into finals, because it\u2019s massive desperation when you give away red cards, yellow cards; you\u2019re not in control of things,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cListen, in the big games, things happen. There\u2019s a process there to go through, so just let that process go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Leinster'sLeinster’s Andrew Porter and Dan Sheehan celebrate after the game. Photograph: Ben Brady\/Inpho <\/p>\n

The Welshman was also encouraged by Dan Sheehan\u2019s first start at number eight against Munster. Injuries to Caelan Doris and Jack Conan prompted Leinster to deploy the Ireland hooker in an unfamiliar role, and the 28-year-old completed the 80 minutes there.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was nothing there to show that he couldn\u2019t do it again,\u201d McBryde said. \u201cAt the end of the day, you want your best rugby players on the field.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the back of the conversations we\u2019ve had, that was the reason we said: these are Dan\u2019s strengths that we see. It\u2019s what we feel we need from an eight. He\u2019s a good ball carrier. He\u2019ll get you across the game line. He\u2019s a good distributor.\u201d <\/p>\n

McBryde said the decision to use Sheehan at the base of the scrum, as well as other players out of their usual positions, would be considered on a \u201ccase-by-case, game-by-game, opposition-by-opposition\u201d basis.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t force anybody in there. It depends a lot on the attitude, the abilities and the attributes that you\u2019ve got,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to keep them stimulated. You need to challenge them differently. They can\u2019t just be doing the same thing over and over again, week in, week out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Further experience at number eight could help Sheehan develop, McBryde said, but Leinster would have to balance that against his value as \u201can out-and-out, world-class hooker\u201d.<\/p>\n

Saturday also marked Jamison Gibson-Park\u2019s first appearance of the season and Joey Carbery made his first start since returning to the province.<\/p>\n

\u201cWas it as smooth as it could be? No, it wasn\u2019t, because it was the first time everybody played together,\u201d McBryde said. \u201cWe knew that, but was it a risk worth taking? Yes, of course.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leinster assistant coach Robin McBryde has backed Tadhg Furlong\u2019s character after the Ireland prop was cited over an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":658368,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[170300,85,46,148902,105,183522,170298],"class_list":["post-658367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-gavin-coombes","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-leinster-rugby","tag-sports","tag-tadhg-furlong","tag-united-rugby-championship"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658367\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}