South Sydney Rabbitohs and England forward is attempting to downgrade a conduct charge handed down to him by the NRL which could end his season after an incident with a WATER BOTTLE.
Burgess has put in an early guilty plea after tossing a water bottle at Sydney forward Kane Evans, after he initially threw the ball at Souths teammate Paul Carter.
But Burgess wants a downgrade from a grade two to a grade one charge, after discovering that the grade two charge could rule him out for two weeks of the finals. A downgrade on Wednesday night will still see Burgess serve a one-match ban, due to loading for a prior offence, and miss Sunday’s qualifying final against Cronulla.
Souths took encouragement from criticism of the severity of the charge, with some notables in the game feeling missing two games in the finals was too harsh for the incident.
“The club notes the public opinions of high profile and greatly respected rugby league figures over the past 24 hours,” said Souths in statement.
Among those was Cronulla captain Paul Gallen, who believed Burgess would probably succeed in getting a downgrade and so be available for the second week of finals but not to face his team on Sunday.
“Missing two games, semi-final games, is harsh,” Gallen told Sky Sports Radio.
“But I don’t think anyone can doubt that the incident itself was a little bit silly.
“A fine and a talking to probably would have been a little bit better. I think he’ll probably get a downgrade….”
