Ireland interim head coach Simon Easterby has strongly defended Tadhg Beirne and Andrew Porter in response to criticism from France head coach Fabien Galthié after last week’s Six Nations meeting between the sides.
Galthié blamed the two Irish players for the ACL injury suffered by his captain Antoine Dupont.
The French scrumhalf was injured as Beirne and Porter cleared out a ruck, Galthié describing their actions as “reprehensible” and referring them to the game’s citing commissioner.
Match referee Angus Gardner and his officials deemed the incident to be a rugby incident, as did Easterby, and there was no citing against any Irish player.
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Simon Easterby defends Beirne and Porter as French criticism prompts abuse
Despite this, the French campaign has continued all week, with Roman Ntamack suggesting a French player would have been sent off for the same incident while also questioning Garry Ringrose’s suspension compared to his own, both of them missing fixtures following red cards.
France’s forwards coach William Servat has also called into question Ireland’s technique at the breakdown.
It has been an unedifying campaign, which has led to a wave of abuse towards Ireland players and their families via social media, mostly directed from France and South Africa, where Beirne has been wrongly linked with an injury suffered by Springboks’ hooker Malcolm Marx.
“Without getting myself into trouble here, I just think it’s the game, unfortunately,” said Easterby, choosing his words carefully.
“These things happen. No player goes out to intentionally injure another player. For the majority of people, looking at it afterwards, everyone felt like it was a rugby incident, which was really unfortunate.
“No player goes out to injure another player. It just doesn’t happen. Whatever the insinuations were from different people, post-game, it’s disappointing because the unfortunate thing is that people who don’t really understand the game pick up on it, and it creates a bit of a shitstorm where people are getting abuse.
“It’s just unnecessary, and it’s not acceptable, but it happens. Those things could have been avoided had maybe other things been said post-game by certain individuals.”
Easterby declined to mention Galthié by name but said: “Well, you just said his name. The French camp have obviously come out pretty strongly post-game about the incident and it could have been handled in a better way.
“And I think on the back of that, it’s created some unnecessary ill-feeling and it’s affected other people in the wider group and that’s disappointing.”
Asked specifically if the two Irish players were receiving abuse from France, Easterby said: “I’m just saying that it’s unnecessary, the coverage on social media, that’s all I am saying. I don’t read it, I don’t necessarily take a lot of notice of it but when it’s directed at certain individuals and certain individuals’ wider family group, then it becomes an issue.
“We talk as coaches all the time and we chat post-game. I think it could have been a different discussion, a different platform to air those frustrations that maybe France had.
“We and World Rugby and the Six Nations believe that there was no case to answer and certainly it didn’t help, it almost sort of fanned the flames of what was a really unfortunate incident.
“But it was a rugby incident and that’s the bottom line. Unfortunately, these things happen.”
