[Kit] Knee braces with plastic buckles

[Paule23]

Law 4.4 (c) [FONT=fs_blakeregular] A player must not wear any items containing buckles, clips, rings, hinges, zippers, screws, bolts or rigid material or projection not otherwise permitted under this Law.

[/FONT]What's the general consensus on knee braces with hard plastic buckles? I won't let people ply in them, at training the other day I had a heated debate with a player who insisted such knee braces were legal, had been purchased from Murrayfield and confirmed by senior SRU people they were legal.

The law specifically disallows them, but what do you do as a referee? Do you allow it? What about those knee braces with metal inserts but beneath neoprene padding?

 

[Pegleg]

Was it marked as WR approved?

 

[SimonSmith]

For all their faults, which are many, HO have got their act together on kit:
https://www.usarugby.org/laws-guidelines/#fndtn-Knee-Braces

 

[Paule23]

Was it marked as WR approved?

I don't they could be seeing as the law specifically prohibits them, but I'll ask next time I see said heated debatee.

For all their faults, which are many, HO have got their act together on kit:

https://www.usarugby.org/laws-guidelines/#fndtn-Knee-Braces

I've said that to a few players, if you're knee is that unstable that you need a brace with metal inserts etc then maybe you need a bit more physio or a move to coaching (or for me refereeing, probably one of the reasons I am pretty tight on this, I'd love to continue to play but with no PCL, twice repaired and now very lax ACL, three times repaired and even laxer MCL and history of 11 knee surgeries, unless I can wear a DonJoy my knee isn't up to it)