Argentine Rugby Union should hang heads in shame

The indecent haste which Pablo Matera has been reinstated as Argentina captain borders on the obscene.

Matera, along with colleagues Guido Petti and Santiago Socino, had been suspended on Monday after the discovery of discriminatory, racist and xenophobic comments by the trio on social media between 2011 and 2013.

The Argentine Rugby Union (UAR) has now said such suspensions were “unnecessary” in light of the players’ apologies and their good behaviour in the years since the comments – labelling the social media posts in question as merely “imprudent and immature”.

Imprudent and immature. Not disgraceful, not reprehensible, not appalling, not unacceptable. Just imprudent and immature.

Now, I completely accept that people do change, that the views held by someone 9 years ago do not necessarily represent the views of that person today and that comments made by 17 and 18 year olds can be stupid and immature and may not even have represented their views at the time.  And, it seems, Matera is now a thoroughly decent bloke.

You cannot escape, however, the vile nature of such comments, nor the fact that the individuals involved need to be held to account. 

I am certainly not an advocate of the “lock ‘em up and throw away the key” approach, but to fail entirely to hold the players accountable and to lift the suspensions and reinstate Matera as captain after only 2 days indicates an utter failure to take this matter seriously, sends out all the wrong messages and reflects incredibly badly on the UAR.

Total Flanker – the older I get, the better I was