The National Conference League has a granted an amnesty to all players who have disciplinary bans to serve.

Any player who has match suspensions still to serve from last year or indeed was awaiting a review of their disciplinary case from earlier in the season will be granted an amnesty that will enable them to play for their clubs if and when the 2020 season gets underway. The only exception will be any players who are serving a ‘Sine die’ suspension.

The NCL is desperate to get a season underway, but as yet there is no indication as to when that may be. This prompted the NCL to review the outstanding discipline cases they still had to consider as well as the number of players who still had match bans to serve.

“We had 21 outstanding cases from the first three weekends of the first season, and obviously we have been in lock down for over two months now.” Explained NCL Chairman, Trevor Hunt. “ That has obviously impacted upon the Disciplinary Panel’s opportunity to meet and deal with the cases or for the players to lodge a personal appeal. By now any suspensions would have been served, and the same could be said of those with bans that were issued late last season and which would affect players at the start of the 2020 campaign.

“But Covid-19 has made it a whole new ball game, and when we do get back playing we want every club to have every available player they can, so that they can start to play fixtures and enjoy their rugby league again.

“Obviously some will view these players as particularly lucky to not be serving a suspension, but we wil be keeping an eye on how they behave once we get underway again.

“The NCL feel it is imperative that we do everything we can to ensure that once the lockdown is lifted and Community clubs can open again, that we maximise the opportunity and desire of everyone to get back playing rugby league.”