The NRL hit Ricky Stuart where it hurt the most. For the next seven days, he's in Canberra Raiders exile.
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The man described as the "heart and soul of the Raiders" paid the ultimate price for lashing out at Jaeman Salmon last week when he labelled him a "weak-gutted dog".
Forget the $25,000 fine he'll have to pay. The biggest cost of the outburst will be having to watch from his lounge room rather than pacing the sidelines when the Raiders fight to keep their season alive on Sunday.
He'll have to watch helplessly until at least next Wednesday morning after the NRL announced its punishment on Tuesday.
Stuart has been suspended for one game, is banned from talking to his players, coaches or staff, cannot show up at the Raiders' Braddon training base and will be locked out of Canberra Stadium.
Stuart's ban came into place at 4pm, allowing him time for one final training session to address his players before he walked out for an unexpected break from coaching.
He will have to foot the bill for the fine rather than the Raiders chipping in, and the NRL hopes it's a warning for other coaches who want to lash out in a press conference.
The Raiders hope Stuart will use the time away to recharge given it will be one of only a handful of weeks in the past 20 years where Stuart hasn't been barking instructions.
"We've got to think about Rick's wellbeing as well," said Raiders boss Don Furner said.
"We'll move forward from there. It's a public job and a hard job, [Stuart's] obviously very disappointed [with what happened] and he's embarrassed.
"He's going to have to put it behind him and move on, and we'll support him."
The Raiders and Stuart have already accepted the NRL's punishment, waiving their right to have five days to reply to the breach notice issued on Tuesday afternoon.
Stuart's duties will be shared between his assistants - premiership-winner Brett White, former New Zealand Warriors coach Andrew McFadden and the experienced Mick Crawley.
"We won't appoint a head coach for the week. They will continue their roles and then work out who does what on match day," Furner said.
The ban is an unprecedented as a punishment for what a coach has said in a press conference.
Stuart said family history was the trigger for his hostility towards Salmon. He apologised for his actions on Sunday and was interviewed by the NRL integrity unit on Monday to explain why he was so angry.
The NRL took all of those factors into their decision, but chief executive Andrew Abdo condemned Stuart's actions.
"Leaders need to set the standard in the game. The comments are completely unacceptable from any individual let alone an official of such experience and standing," Abdo said.
"It's unacceptable regardless of the context or personal matters. We've looked at the context, and that's a private matter. I don't wish to talk about it.
"This is a highly unusual case, and we have taken the significant step of proposing a suspension from his duties for one week.
"This will be a full suspension precluding Ricky from having any involvement with any club activity either in person or remotely. Furthermore, the fine must not be paid by the club but by Ricky himself."
Stuart was at Raiders training on Tuesday morning and led the team through their session as they started preparations for a must-win game against the St George-Illawarra Dragons.
But he packed up his things on Tuesday afternoon and has been warned not to breach the conditions of his suspension.
"Clearly everyone is disappointed about what has occurred and they are accepting of the sanction," Abdo said. "Ricky cannot coach or train individuals remotely or in person."
The Raiders will turn to Stuart's assistants to take the reins, but the club will not appoint a replacement head coach for the week.
The Raiders board met on Sunday to discuss Stuart's outburst, and chief executive Don Furner said they had agreed to accept the NRL's punishment.
"We'll move forward from there. It's a public job and a hard job, [Stuart's] obviously very disappointed [with what happened] and he's embarrassed," Furner said earlier on Tuesday.
Stuart said his hostility stemmed from family history with Salmon, but few details are known about what triggered Stuart to be so scathing.
Stuart's son Jackson played in the same junior team as Salmon at Cronulla and there was an incident between the two more than a decade ago. It's understood it was one of a number of incidents.
The Raiders must win their four remaining games this year to be any chance of making the finals and Stuart's absence is a critical blow to that.
However, Canberra officials believe the team will cope given Stuart and several other NRL coaches have been forced to miss training or games in the past two years because of COVID-19 protocols.
Captain Elliott Whitehead says the players will rally around Stuart and get on with keeping their NRL season alive.
The Raiders skipper, who was sitting alongside Stuart when he called Penrith half Jaeman Salmon a "weak-gutted dog" in Saturday's post-match press conference, said the controversy wouldn't distract the team at a critical stage of their season.
"We've got his back, he had his reasons," Whitehead said.
"I'm not going to go into them but we're all supportive of Ricky and he knows he probably shouldn't have said it on that platform.
"He's upset he let his emotions get the better of him."
Whitehead said their gameplan would need to come to the fore to make his job as easy as possible.
"Whoever comes in, nothing changes ... we've got a gameplan that we've got to stick to, we've used that for the last couple of weeks so nothing will change in that department either," he said.
"As a club we're moving forward and not trying to worry about last week, we've got a job to do this week and that's to win a game of footy.
"We are disappointed we lost last week but we're trying to bounce back from that because we have to."
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