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09th Dec 2016

Dylan Hartley sent off for sickening attack on Sean O’Brien

Straight red

Patrick McCarry

Dylan Hartley just can’t help himself.

It may have been a while since the England hooker found himself on the naughty step but he will be stewing there for at least two months after a quite deliberate and disgusting swinging arm assault on Sean O’Brien.

On as a second-half substitute for Northampton Saints, the England captain lasted all of six minutes on the field.

He was helpless to stop O’Brien crashing over for a vital Leinster try and set out to, quite literally, deliver a leveller to the Ireland flanker.

It was gruesome, awful stuff and it left O’Brien in a heap.

 

Referee Jerome Garces sent the replays upstairs for a review but told the TMO, “For me it is clear, a swinging arm… It’s a clear red card.”

Hartley jogged off and England head coach Eddie Jones – the man that revived his Test career – was fuming up in the stands.

Jones fuming

Hartley has a long, long list of offences and has racked up almost a year in bans from rugby for separate, ugly offences.

In May 2015 he was banned for four weeks after a headbutt on Saracens’ Jamie George while he got a straight red card for this incident involving Leicester Tigers’ Matt Smith in 2014:

Matt Smith

This will certainly damage Hartley’s chances of claiming captaincy of the 2027 British & Irish Lions.

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