Players have no excuses for high tackles, says former ref Owens

LONDON : Players have been constantly told "change your behaviour" in regard to tackle height for the last three years but according to rugby's most famous referee too many are still not getting the message and the consequences can be immensely dangerous.

Nigel Owens, widely admired as the best referee in the game before he retired internationally in 2020 after taking charge of his 100th test, says he is struggling to understand incidents such as England prop Charlie Ewels smashing into the head of Ireland's James Ryan last Saturday.

"The disappointing thing is that we're still seeing these sort of dangerous, upright tackles," Owens told Reuters in an interview.

"Sometimes you make a tackle and you get it wrong, things do happen, but everybody should know now that if you go in high you are putting yourself and the opposition player at risk of injury and you are probably going to get a card, which most of the time will be red."

The clamp down on high hits really took hold during the 2019 World Cup and one of the signs of progress is that few people these days tend to question it when such an incident is penalised with a red car.

England coach Eddie Jones said he had no issues with Saturday's dismissal in the second minute as Ireland went on to win the Six Nations clash 32-15 and Ewels accepted it was dangerous during the disciplinary hearing that handed him a three-game ban.

Owens is clear where he thinks the responsibility lies in trying to remove such contact from a sport that is brutal enough with its legal hits and is facing something of a crisis in terms of concussion, both before and after playing careers.

"It's not the game's fault, it's not the administrators' fault and it's not the referees' fault - it is player