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Wales Online
Wales Online
Sport
Dylan James

The genuinely 'worst rugby tackle ever' leaves viewers disgusted

The spear tackle. A wince-worthy, horrifying act which involves a player being dumped over the horizontal and driven into the ground. Thankfully, we see very few of them these days.

This one, however, remains perhaps the worst seen on a field and has been condemned as a complete and utter disgrace to the sport. There are shades of Tana Umaga's horrific spear on Brian O'Driscoll on the Lions tour in 2005, only this is far worse.

Allan MacMahon of the Balmain Tigers picks up Newtown Jets' Mick Ryan and launches him head-first into the ground in a piledriver move that belongs in a WWE wrestling ring.

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It comes as absolutely no surprise that this was a red card offence. Many would argue that such an act was worthy of a bigger punishment.

Ryan's team mates flooded onto the scene with MacMahon in their sights before the punches started rolling. Incredibly, Ryan reportedly got up and played the rest of the game.

The incident occurred back in 1979, and has now become a popular clip on social media, with hundreds of thousands of views across different platforms.

It has resurfaced again on Instagram this week through Rugby Zone on Instagram. Viewers were left in disbelief after watching the tackle.

"Nowadays, he'd be banned and charged for attempted murder." said one.

"Jail sentence for this type of abuse" said another.

In a strange twist in the tale, Ryan and MacMahon would actually become team mates in 1982 at Newtown Jets, and would form the team's centre partnership.

MacMahon went on to coach Newcastle Knights in the UK after he retired, before he suddenly passed away in 2003 at the age of 48.

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