Exclusive: World Rugby backtrack on controversial red card protocol for the 2026 Six Nations
Matthew Carley shows a yellow and red card during the November international between Ireland and South Africa.
World Rugby has moved to provide more clarity and consistency around red cards with a new directive for match officials during the 2026 Six Nations.
This comes after several high-profile sending-offs during last year’s Autumn Nations Series, leaving fans puzzled as to when an action warranted a permanent red card or a 20-minute red card.
Last year, ahead of the Six Nations, the 20-minute red card law trial was officially given a global trial greenlight by World Rugby, which allowed teams to replace a sent-off player after they served that sin-binning period in order to ‘maintain the spectacle and competitive integrity of elite matches’.
A World Rugby statement at the time added that referees retained the ‘authority to issue a full and permanent red card for any foul play considered deliberate and highly dangerous’.
However, the confusion at the end of last year was created when World Rugby did not disclose an update in the protocol following the 2025 July internationals to include acts of foul play that were ‘always illegal’.
World Rugby’s move for clarity
This was thrown into the spotlight when Springboks lock Lood de Jager was issued with a full, permanent red card for his challenge on Thomas Ramos, with South Africa reduced to 14 men for the remainder of the game as the second rower was judged to have committed an offence that was ‘always an illegal action with a high degree of danger’.
In a move to clear up that confusion during this year’s Six Nations, Planet Rugby has exclusively learnt that the tournament organisers and World Rugby have agreed that the permanent red card will be reserved for acts of thuggery.
This is a complete backtrack on the aforementioned protocol update that World Rugby implemented after the July internationals last year.
Incidents like De Jager’s last year will now result in a yellow card with the referee sending the incident to be reviewed by the Foul Play Review Officer, aka TMO Bunker, who will then decide whether it warrants a 20-minute red card or a yellow card sanction is sufficient.
However, the referee will still retain the ability to issue a permanent sanction for thuggish acts like the ones detailed in Law 9.12, which reads: “A player must not physically or verbally abuse anyone. Physical abuse includes, but is not limited to, biting, punching, contact with the eye or eye area, striking with any part of the arm, shoulder, head or knee(s), stamping, trampling, tripping or kicking.”
So under the new directive, Eben Etzebeth would still have been issued with a full, permanent red card for eye-gouging Alex Mann in Cardiff last year, and so will incidents like France prop Mohamed Haouas punching Scotland’s Jamie Ritchie during the 2020 Six Nations.
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This is not a change in the law per se; it is a change in the way that the officials will interpret the red card sanctions, a World Rugby source with knowledge of the Six Nations directives explained.
However, it was agreed that it was too confusing to continue this path of permanent red cards for always illegal acts, prompting the backtracking from post-July last year. This is likely to remain in place going forward unless another decision is made during the Shape of the Game meeting scheduled for this month, where the future of the 20-minute red card will be decided.
Postive change
The source further explained that the directives from World Rugby’s refereeing group won’t have any further significant changes so close to the next Rugby World Cup.
While there are no other changes for the upcoming Six Nations, it was confirmed to this publication that the priorities remain the same, being foul play, lineout to maul, scrum, breakdown and player safety.
It’s a positive move from World Rugby and the Six Nations, considering how the red card decisions dominated the Autumn Nations series last year.
De Jager’s teammate Franco Mostert was also shown a permanent red card during the Test match against Italy a week on from the clash with France.
He, too, was judged to have always been illegal when attempting a tackle on Italy fly-half Paolo Garbisi and deemed to have made shoulder-to-head contact on the playmaker – therefore, no mitigation was applied.
If a similar incident were to occur this Six Nations, Mostert would be yellow-carded and have the incident reviewed by the TMO bunker, who would then decide whether to upgrade the incident to a 20-minute red or not, which was the case with Tadhg Beirne and James Ryan during the Ireland matches against New Zealand and South Africa, respectively.
