12 March 2024 , 14:21
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Leigh captain John Asiata insists he’s done with all the furore over his controversial tackle technique.
The star Aussie forward is currently sidelined after tearing a calf muscle in his side’s recent loss at St Helens. But he was back in the headlines following that match having been yellow carded after just 41 SECONDS for diving at the lower leg of Sione Mata’utia. Last year, furious Saints boss Paul Wellens went on the attack after the RFL did nothing to punish Asiata for similar “reckless and dangerous” tackles in a heated Challenge Cup semi-final which left four of his players injured.
Back then, Asiata was acting within the rules but the governing body outlawed that type of challenge in the off-season. It was a big surprise, then, that the ex-North Queensland Cowboys ace enacted a similar tackle in the very first set of their Super League clash. It sparked an all-in melee but Leigh boss Adrian Lam maintained it was an “outrageous” decision to sin–bin his influential No 13 claiming first contact was above the knee.
Last week, the match review panel ruled the challenge did “endanger the safety of an opponent” and involved an “unacceptable risk of injury.” There was no ban or fine attached. But the club will tonight appeal the validity of the charge. Speaking for the first time on the second incident, Asiata said: “I wasn’t surprised [it blew up].
“I knew if I did a tackle like that, even if it was legal, it was going to blow up anyway. But it is what it is. I’ll move forward from that.”
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With injury-hit Leigh still searching for a first win of the season, Dream Team star Asiata hopes to be back in action sooner than expected. He said: “If you look at my scan they’ll probably say eight weeks. But I’m looking at six to eight.”
Leigh's John Asiata (Paul Currie/REX/Shutterstock)Challenge Cup holders Leigh head to Hull on Saturday looking to finally get up and running. They looked set to get that maiden victory when racing into a 16-0 lead against Leeds on Friday. But the hosts ended up agonisingly losing 22-16 and also lost star half-back Lachlan Lam to a nasty leg injury as problems piled up.
Asiata said: “If you look at the first half and beginning of the second, we completed a lot more sets than what we have in the past three games. It just shows that when you hold the ball you can put plays on that you’ve trained for and put points on. The first half is what we’re built on. That’s how we want to play the game. I think in the second half we got some decisions that didn’t go our way and just the way the boys handled that…
"It’s sort of hard for me to say because I didn’t play… but it looked very different to what they did in the first half. Whether it was talk, I’m not too sure. The boys will look at it this week. You have to learn from those ones and take what you can. What the boys did in the first half is a positive moving forward.”