Vodacom Bulls loosehead prop Jacques van Rooyen has been handed a one-match suspension for his red-card offence against Western Province this past Saturday.

Van Rooyen was shown a red card in the second half of the Bulls’ 22-20 win over Western Province at Newlands last Saturday evening for a dangerous tackle on Warrick Gelant.

The 34-year-old appeared in front of a SA Rugby disciplinary hearing on Tuesday, where the disciplinary committee decided that the tackle was an ‘entry-level’ offence and therefore reduced the two-week ban to just one week.

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Van Rooyen will therefore not be available for Saturday’s match between the Bulls and Cheetahs at Loftus Versfeld.

A separate referees meeting was also held, which dealt with the way the incident was handled between referee AJ Jacobs and TMO Rasta Rashivenge, who caused confusion when initially recommending a yellow card before switching to red after being questioned by Jacobs. Contributing to the confusion was that the big screen at Newlands stadium was not in use, so Jacobs could not review the incident himself and had to assess based on TMO information.

Good news for the Bulls is that Springbok prop Lizo Gqoboka is back in training. However, it is uncertain whether he will be brought straight back into the starting lineup for the Cheetahs game, with his match fitness still an issue.

It could be more likely that 23-year-old Gerhard Steenekamp, who was on the bench against Province, will start on Saturday.

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