The original Ban from the MRP didn't mention anything to with 'unnatural range of motion' or 'unnatural position'.

This is the original ban

"Dangerous Contact - Defender uses any part of their body forcefully to twist, bend or otherwise apply pressure to the limb or limbs of an opposing player in a way that involves an unacceptable risk of injury to that player."

So wether the Appeal panel mentioned unnatural position or whatever is irrelevant to the original Ban

I look forward to seeing whether this method of 'slowing the PTB down' is now more widely used knowing theres no cause to sanction. Id guess if you use it further down the field and not near your own try line itd only result in a penalty and not even a sin binning?

The charge is the "unacceptable risk of injury" if the arm wasn't taken out of the natural range of motion then this can't exist

The word is risk not actual. Do we really want this to become common place in the game?

Of course it can, twisting a players arm behind his back even in 'natural range of motion' can cause injury. The notes even state that if Atkin hadn't have changed his position it would have been worse.

The daft thing about this whole saga is that it has happened when there was a ban which was pretty much universally accepted was warranted.

Oh and Risk doesn't mean something will happen, that's the whole point.

Cheers Lurch, that’s exactly what I thought. Cheers for confirming.

Yes, but the risk isn't "unacceptable" if he's not pulling the arm out of normal range of movement. There is risk in every single tackle on the rugby pitch, that's just the sport. The "unacceptable" would only apply if he is twisting out of the normal range of motion, because clearly the risk of causing injury there is high. He's almost never going to injure somebody by pulling their arm within the natural range of motion

But again the appeal judiciary stated that it was only because catkin reacted and changed his position that the arm didn't go out of 'normal range'.

You put your arm where Atkins was and then think that there is someone twisting it - normal range of motion or not it could injure you.

It was a clear bit of fowl play that nobody seem to question when given a ban. well apart from Saints that is. The way it has subsequently been handled by the RFL is an absolute farce. For example there's no actual ruling, what happened did it get downgraded to a grade A, did the whole thing get thrown out because the appeal was flawed, I don't know why Saints fans are getting al uppity people are having a go at the RFL not Saints.

Handley in the squad

The verdict was he wasn't guilty of the charge he was faced with, which is why the entire ban got overturned