THE International Rugby Board is poised to get tough with players found guilty of eye-gouging to wipe out the offence from the sport.

By Alasdair Reid in Johannesburg

THE International Rugby Board is poised to get tough with players found guilty of eye-gouging to wipe out the offence from the sport.

And it could mean the victims of offences having a say in the punishment meted out by the IRB.

The crackdown comes after Springbok Schalk Burger's attack on British and Irish Lions winger Luke Fitzgerald last weekend.

Burger was sin-binned for the offence in the first minute of the game and then received an eight-week ban, the same suspension dished out on Sunday to Italy captain Sergio Parisse after an incident against New Zealand.

The IRB have now vowed to "send out the strongest possible message" that gouging will not be tolerated.

Burger and Parisse's bans follows high-profile cases including Alan Quinlan, Neil Best, Olivier Azam, Marius Tincu, Dylan Hartley and Mauro Bergamasco.

The suspensions in those cases ranged from eight weeks to the 26-week ban which cost Hartley a place in England's 2007 World Cup plans.

Lions skipper Paul O'Connell's Munster team-mate Quinlan was ruled out of the Lions tour after being suspended for 12 weeks for a gouging incident in the Heineken Cup semi-final against Leinster.

Asked whether he was surprised that Burger received a lighter suspension than Quinlan, O'Connell said: "It's strange and why it would differ I don't know. The Burger incident looked worse."

Lions scrum coach Graham Rowntree questioned why any player would gouge an opponent. He said: "How a player can think he can get away with it with so many cameras watching the game is beyond me.

"There is no room for it in the game. What would make a guy want to do that?"