Olivier Azam will meet his lawyers next week with a view to pursuing a libel action against Rob Andrew. The Gloucester and France hooker was cleared yesterday by an independent Rugby Football Union inquiry of an allegation of racism made after the Premiership match between the two clubs at Kingsholm last December.
Azam was sent off in the first half of the game, along with the Newcastle flanker Epi Taione, after a fight. Andrew subsequently accused Azam of making a racially insulting remark to Taione as the players were leaving the field and he followed up his remarks straight after the match in a newspaper column.
He also claimed there was a racist element among the Kingsholm crowd. After a war of words between the two clubs which culminated in the Gloucester owner Tom Walkinshaw banning Andrew from Kingsholm indefinitely and the club's supporters' association threatening to take legal action unless the former England outside-half made a public apology, the RFU set up a three-man panel chaired by Michael Beloff QC to look into the matter.
Beloff's report, which cleared Azam and the Gloucester crowd, was published yesterday. Azam, who was training with the France squad ahead of tomorrow's Six Nations international against Ireland in Paris, was not available for comment last night but his solicitor, John Partridge, said it was not necessarily the end of the matter.
"I will be meeting Olivier next week to discuss whether any further action is to be taken on his behalf with particular reference to comments made in the media," he said.
A statement from Newcastle last night said that Andrew would not be commenting on the outcome but, while there had been a feeling in Gloucester that the RFU should charge Andrew with bringing the game into disrepute if his accusation against Azam was found to be groundless, Beloff made it plain that a line should be drawn under the issue.
He did, though, criticise Andrew, Walkinshaw and the Newcastle chairman David Thompson who stormed into the referee's room after the match.
"We do not find, however, that any of the acts or comments made by them were sufficiently prejudicial to the interests of the game to justify disciplinary proceedings," ran the report. "Each of the three persons was acting, as each saw it, in good faith, under the stress of some emotion and inspired by a commendable opposition to racism in rugby."
Gloucester are unlikely to press the RFU to charge Andrew. "We said we would be bound by its outcome," said the club's chief executive Ken Nottage. "While the ban on Rob Andrew coming to Kingsholm still stands, there will be a board meeting in the near future to reconsider it.
"Everyone at the club is delighted that Olivier's innocence has been established beyond any doubt. What would be welcomed by Olivier and by the Gloucester supporters is a public apology by Rob Andrew."
The report concluded that there was insufficient evidence to justify disciplinary proceedings against Azam. "Mr Taione is the only player who claims to have heard the racially abusive words, which Mr Azam has always denied uttering. One Gloucester spectator was guilty of uttering two phrases of racial abuse . . . We acquit Gloucester and its supporters of racism."
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