A rule is a rule is a rule . . .

I noticed a few comments from media people this week about the changes in umpiring interpretations since the season began a mere nine weeks ago. It is crystal clear that many of the zero-tolerance, tiggy-touch wood interpretations have been remaindered again this year.

I'm at a loss to understand why it is that umpires are instructed to be overly technical, intransigent and intolerant as the season begins, only to have the whistles pretty much packed away by finals time, as suggested by James Hird on Fox Sports' On the Couch.

As the season began, merely touching a player who had just marked was virtually an automatic 50-metre penalty. In Round Nine you could dance an evening two-step with the player and the umpire's whistle stays firmly at his side.

Surely a law of the game is a law of the game? It is frankly ludicrous that the operating interpretation of so many "laws of the game" should vary so greatly over a period of two months. It hardly helps the AFL's campaign for greater respect for umpires for the elite umpiring department in the country to not be able to make up its mind what does and does not constitute a free kick or a 50-metre penalty across the space of two months.

Who makes these decisions? Is it Jeff Gieschen, my favourite whipping boy? Or Rowan Sawers? Adrian Anderson? Andrew Demetriou? Guys, you have our sport in trust. Isn't it about time you stopped screwing around with it?