Rugby World Cup 2019: High tackle crackdown ‘hasn’t changed that much’, says England’s Elliot Daly

John Quill was sent off during Eddie Jones’s side’s win over the USA, while Piers Francis has been cited

England back Elliot Daly has claimed that while World Rugby’s focus on high tackles is good for player safety, it hasn’t the England players’ approach to tackling.

The World Cup has thus far been dominated by debate of a number of high tackle incident, with John Quill dismissed in England’s victory over the USA for a late no-arms tackle to the head of Owen Farrell.

And though England centre Piers Francis has subsequently been cited for his hit on Will Hooley in the game’s very first contact incident, Daly insists that not much has changed with regards to the players’ approach.

“You don’t mean to hit people there if you hit them there,” Daly said on Friday.

“[The crackdown] hasn’t changed that much in my eyes. You want to make good tackles, that’s all you really want to do.

“Sometimes you slip up and you’ll get deemed high tackle now.

“You can’t really think about it, you’ve just got to do what you do and try to tackle properly.

“So it’s just something you’ve got to be wary of, any rule that comes in, especially that one at the moment. But it doesn’t change too much day to day.”

Reece Hodge and Rey Lee-Lo have both received bans after they were cited for high tackles against Fiji and Russia respectively.

World Rugby unveiled a new official framework for deciding the level of sanction for a high tackle earlier in the year, aiming to clarify the officials’ process when making a decision.

But until Quill’s off-ball, after-the-whistle, no-arms shoulder into the head of Farrell, there had not been a red card at the tournament – despite a number of incidents seemingly fulfilling the criteria for a sending off.

The news of Francis’ citing came as no surprise, and Eddie Jones is prepared to accept the outcome of his hearing, which will be held in Tokyo at some point in the next few days.

“We never discuss that area, we leave it to the judiciary or the citing commission,” he said.

“And then we’ll take whatever is handed out.”

Both Ley-Lo and Hodge were given bans of three matches, with their punishments reduced from a six-game entry point due to their clean disciplinary records and good conduct.

Referee Nic Berry produced the first red card of the World Cup, with the USA’s John Quill sent off (Getty)

Sir Clive Woodward, who guided England to World Cup victory in 2003, has criticised the ban given to Hodge, but feels differently about Quill’s tackle of Farrell, and those of Lee-Lo and team mate Motu Matu’u against Russia.

Woodward has suggested these are the tackles that World Rugby should be looking to eradicate.

“The ugly assault on Owen Farrell by John Quill late in the second half is why we have red cards and the deliberate, targeted high shots by the Samoans Ray Ley Lo and Motu Matu’u against Russia are why we dismiss the disgraced players from the field of play and ban them,” he wrote in his column for the Daily Mail.

“They are the deliberate, callous, illegal challenges that the game must eradicate and must always be punished with an automatic red and a ban so they see the error of their ways.”