Overturning a blue card handed out by a referee is going to be as difficult as getting an 80-minute game out of Wayne Barnes.
The blue card initiative is about to begin in domestic rugby after first being trialled in the Northland union in 2014.
Referees who suspect a player had been concussed will show a blue card to the player and he will have to leave the field. He will face a mandatory three-week stand down period.
Referees would be trained to recognise concussed players.
New Zealand Rugby medical director Ian Murphy said there was no suggestion referees were doctors but the blue card made it clear players had to leave the field and eliminated any pressure on the referee to keep the player on the field.
The player’s name would be registered with the provincial union and he would be tracked until he is allowed to go back on to the field.
Murphy said there could obviously be mistakes with a player not being concussed but just landing awkwardly.
That can be worked through with the union and the national body.
He said the national body had deliberately put a high threshold on concussion after discussion with medical experts.
Players had to show footage they had not been concussed and it would be reviewed at a national level.He said a note from a doctor will not get a clearance.
"We are not going to allow someone to go to a GP, who has got a thousand other things happening on Monday morning, and get a note about not being concussed," he said.
"It makes a mockery of the whole system."
Long term, the union was looking to get base line concussion data on every player in New Zealand.
It was trialling a system of recording base line data of every player in school rugby in Horowhenua-Kapiti this season and hoped to extend it to secondary school rugby across the country next year.
He did not think the renewed focus on concussion was putting people off the game.
People were just accepting it was part of the game and the framework around it.
The blue card initiative would be used in premier, premier 2, senior and women’s club games in Otago.
