Mealamu ban cut to two weeks

Edinburgh - New Zealand hooker Keven Mealamu has had his ban for headbutting England captain Lewis Moody halved from four weeks to two weeks following an appeal hearing here on Friday.

That means that although Mealamu will be ruled out of the All Blacks internationals against Scotland here on Saturday and Ireland in Dublin next week next week, he will be available for the 'grand slam' tour finale against Wales in Cardiff on November 27.

His suspension was reduced after an appeal panel decided he had not intentionally meant to headbutt Moody during the match, which the All Blacks won 26-16.

Mealamu can also play for the Barbarians in their match against world champions South Africa at Twickenham on December 4, having previously been selected for the invitational side.

Hikawera Elliot will make his Test debut in Mealamu's absence against Scotland at Murrayfield this weekend.

"For me it's been a tough week, having something like this hanging over me," Mealamu told reporters at New Zealand's hotel here on Friday.

"I've never, ever played the game to hurt anyone. To finally get this come through to say the way I did things was pretty reckless and I didn't take care in how I did it is a lot better than saying I intentionally tried to headbutt someone," the 32-year-old added.

"I feel a lot better and I'll take a lot more care the next time I do a clean out like that again."

Mealamu said he remembered little of his clash with Moody.

"The first I knew about the incident was when they said I was getting cited for it.

"It's hard trying to put it into context, it's something that happened just like that, it was two seconds in an 80 minute game."

The All Blacks were furious with the implication Mealamu, a veteran of 82 Tests, had deliberately struck Moody.

New Zealand assistant coach Steve Hansen, who earlier in the week said the team would "fight to the death" to overturn Mealamu's ban, was delighted by the appeal decision that means the front row can resume playing on November 22.

"The discussion with the various people has always been the same. There was no intent to clash heads," Hansen said. "For us that was the most important thing, to clear his name.

"Headbutting intentionally is quite a huge act of foul play. He's not like that, we know he's not like that and that's why we've supported him so strongly. Reckless yes, but it certainly wasn't intentional."

An initial International Rugby Board (IRB) disciplinary hearing here on Tuesday saw Scottish judicial officer, Professor Lorne Crerar, ban Mealamu for four weeks, a suspension that ruled him out of the remainder of the tour.

But his ban was reduced after an appeal panel chaired by South Africa's Peter Ingwersen, together with Robert Williams (Wales) and Jean Noel Couraud (France), decided Mealamu had not acted deliberately.

An appeal committee statement said that although they upheld the original decision that there had been an act of foul play, having had the opportunity to review the video footage, they concluded the act was not intentional and that it merited a lower end entry point in the IRB list of sanctions.

Effectively, this meant the appeal panel thought the offence was now worth only a maximum ban of four weeks, rather than Crerar's starting point of eight.

But, like him, they halved the ban they might otherwise have given because of Mealamu's record and "in view of the compelling mitigating factors and the absence of aggravating factors".