Why are hip throws illegal? Saying that they could cause injury is one of the craziest excuses I've ever heard! I mean, in a sport where you can knee people on the nose or kick them in the face, hip throws are deemed dangerous! I hate it when a local fighter performs an illegal technique or comes close with a kick and the home support cheers like a football crowd. I wonder how hard it is for the judges to put all that out of their minds and score the fight as THEY see it.

Grabbing the spine is oviously dangerous but I think that the reason its illegal is due to it being a spoiling technique - its used by people who are getting beat in the clinch in order to free themselves.

Jonathan -If you put your head down into a very dangerous position ( eg. to evade punches) it looks very bad to the judges and this will be reflected in the scorecards. Its also the same if you turn your back. It doesn't matter that your opponent didn't take advantage of the situation, the mere fact that your defence is poor will not look good at all!