We often don’t agree with the Match Review Panel, but we think they got it right on James Kelly’s “bump” that flattened Brendon Goddard.

And just so anyone who knows of our Bombers allegiance doesn’t think we’re miffed at our new star player copping a knock, we think the MRP’s decision on Paddy Ryder’s hit on Luke McPharlin was right too.

So, the Kelly decision was an opportunity for the Chicken Littles to come out and claim the end of civilisation. Kelly’s teammate and captain, Joel Selwood, tweeted “ 'Sad day: the bump is dead' ”. North Melbourne forward Drew Petrie joined the clamour: “It says to us all, as players, 'Don't bump' ”

No, fellas. What it says is don’t iron out a bloke off the ball with a shirtfront. Steve Johnson did a similar thing last year. At least when Kelly hit Goddard the ball is in shot — Johnson was in a different postcode.

Kelly, Johnson and Ryder didn’t execute a bump. They went into the contest with the objective of hurting their opponent. If Kelly wanted to keep Goddard away from the contest, he could have legally done so by extending his arms and shepherding.

Guys, you can bump as much as you like. Deliver a hip and shoulder bump to an opponent’s side and, as long as you keep your feet and don’t fly, there’s virtually no chance of being suspended.

The tweets could more properly have remarked on the end of the shirtfront. And good riddance.

On the AFL’s website tonight, The Giesch makes a not-very-astounding assertion:

Last week, Brisbane Lions midfielder Tom Rockliff labeled the pushing rule 'bizarre', claiming he was unaware he could not push any player in a marking contest.

Rockliff's remarks have surprised Gieschen, who says it is outlined on the Rules of the Game DVD.

The problem, Jeff, is that the 2013 Laws of Australian Football says you can push a player (in the side or the chest) in a marking contest — as long as the ball is within 5 metres.

Forget the DVD, Jeff. Get your mob to umpire to the rules that are written in the book. There’s a fair chance that we’ll get something that resembles football out of it.

Release the Giesch and reclaim the game.

Caught a bit of AFL360 tonight on Foxtel where the discussion was about the Reid-Bellchambers free kick from Anzac Day. Discussion focussed on “two actions”.

Forget the umpires, guys, the ball was 13 to 15 metres away when Reid pushed Bellchambers out of the way.

Right decision. Wrong reason. There’s a real problem in our game when the umpires are not umpiring to the Laws of Australian Football.

As AussieRulesBlog sat comfortably at the MCG on Anzac Day, there was much consternation amongst Barcode supporters when free kicks were paid after Barcodes defenders pushed their opponents before taking a mark.

It was blithely assumed by those well-informed supporters that this was a scheme hatched in the AFL Umpiring Department to deprive the Barcodes of their rightful victory, some misapplication of the new interpretation of ‘hands in the back’. The Reid-Bellchambers decision, in particular, created some excitement among the black and white faithful, more especially because Reid clearly pushed Bellchambers in the side rather than the back.

AussieRulesBlog isn’t shy about taking on the The Giesch and his mob, but we generally like to have our facts straight before going for the Giesch’s throbbing jugular.

To take the new interpretation out of the equation, we consulted our archived copy of the Laws of Football, 2008 edition — yes, we know that’s sad.

15.4.3 Permitted Contact
Other than the prohibited contact identified under law 15.4.5, a player may make contact with another player:
(b) by pushing the other player with an open hand in the chest or side of the body provided that the football is no more than 5 metres away from the player;

Sharp-eyed readers will have spotted a key phrase: provided that the football is no more than 5 metres away from the player.

Just to put this into context, the goal ‘square’ is 10 metres long and the two players in this contest are around 2 metres tall. So if a kicked ball is descending toward a player and is further away than half the length of the goal square or two and a half times the player’s height, it is a free-kick offence to push an opponent.

And guess what? Law 15.4.3 (b) appears again, in exactly the same words, in the 2013 Laws of Australian Football.

So we went looking for the video footage to check out our theory.

Here’s the Reid-Bellchambers contest, in live footage, and the start of the pushing motion. Note that the ball is not in view:

and again in live footage, here’s the ball entering the frame about 3 to 4 metres from Reid’s arms:

We’ve been able to analyse this footage fairly closely (although we don’t have high-speed or high-def footage). From the time of the push, in the first frame above, to the ball finishing in Reid’s arms, about six tenths of a second elapse.

From the ball entering the frame, in the second screen dump, to the ball in Reid’s arms is about 0.16 seconds. If the distance between the ball and Reid in the second frame is conservatively 3.5 metres, the ball is travelling at around 22 metres per second.

Working backwards, in the six tenths of a second between the push and the mark, the ball travelled about 13 metres. The ball must have been 13 metres away, or more, when Reid pushed his opponent out of the contest: FREE KICK Law 15.4.3.

For television viewers, ire is not thwarted when the umpire gives the reason for the free kick as “two actions”. What does two actions have to do with it? Where is the rule on two actions? Another of the Giesch’s nonsense interpretations.

One thing was crystal clear in last night’s season opener between the Bombers and the Crows. Only one team had understood and practised the changed rules, especially sliding into a contest.

Crows coach Brenton Sanderson’s contention that the Crows were ‘guinea pigs’ for the sliding rule is nonsense. Both teams were playing under the new rules for the first time (for Premiership points), but only the Bombers seemed to have practised new tackling techniques and understood how to play to the new rules and interpretations.

Zero tolerance is the modern AFL’s preferred response to a crisis. Zero tolerance of racism. Zero tolerance of high tackles. Zero tolerance of hands in the back. Zero tolerance of sling tackles. Ad infinitum.

The problem with the zero tolerance approach is that it removes context and nuance from the decision equation. In a zero tolerance world, the Lindsay Thomas–Gary Rohan incident is superficially similar to the Goodes slide tackle and so must be stamped out. Except that on closer inspection it’s not similar at all. The context, intent and subtle nuances of Thomas’ actions are quite different to Goodes’.

It doesn’t seem that long ago that the AFL’s umpiring department declared a sort of total war of players maintaining a tackle after an opponent had disposed of the ball. Such was the zero tolerance approach of the umpires that whistles were on a hair trigger. Not being able to see that the ball had been released was simply no defence. “We WILL stamp out players holding opponents after they’ve disposed of the ball!”

And so, for a time, there were a rash of absolutely unfair free kicks paid against players who had no chance of knowing that the player they’d tackled no longer had the ball.

Fast forward to rounds seven and eight of the 2012 season from those far off days of zero tolerance and you’d think you are in a time warp. Players are routinely tackled to the ground well after disposing of the ball and the umpires’ reaction is . . . indifference.

AussieRulesBlog has long espoused the view that the rules should be interpreted the same way in the grand Final as in round one of pre-season. We’ll go further. The interpretation should be the same from season to season unless there’s a compelling reason to change it.

Where have these huge swings in interpretation come from? Zero tolerance. If you swing wildly in one direction, karma has a way of evening up by swinging you equally as far in the other direction. Zero tolerance to indifference — racism being the welcome exception.

Wouldn’t it be nice to come to a new season knowing that the umpires would apply the same interpretation of the rules that we’d been used to for years? Even if it were only two years?

Isaac Newton said it best. For every action, there’s and equal and opposite reaction. Until there’s a moderate and considered approach to these issues that crop up from time to time, we’re fated to suffer lurches in the opposite direction.

The announcement of experimental rules for the 2012 pre-season games carries no surprises. We were alerted to these changes weeks ago, but it’s interesting to see the final implementation.

AussieRulesBlog has made no secret of our enthusiasm for any change that removes ugly wrestling from ruck contests. The explanatory notes make for some intriguing consideration.

Ruckmen will not be permitted to make contact with their opponent prior to bounces and throw-ins, with umpires ensuring the players do not make contact with each other until the ball leaves the umpire’s hand. The trial is designed to encourage ruckmen to contest the ball, rather than focus on nullifying their opponent, as well as making ruck contests easier to adjudicate.

We’re not entirely sure that the last point has been achieved by adding another rule for umpires to adjudicate! It will be fascinating to see how ruckmen manage this new process.

Centre bounces have generally been genuine contests since the dividing line between ruckmen was introduced. Athletic ruckmen have had the opportunity to leap high above the more lumbering types and the umpires have, in our judgement, generally done a good job in restricting the lumberers from taking the leapers’ run away from them. The second centre circle has reduced the advantage that more athletic ruckmen might otherwise have had.

So, for this trial, at ball ups around the ground, ruckmen will not be able to touch each other until the ball has left the umpire’s hands. Frankly, we’re not sure that there’ll be much difference discernable. The ruckmen will stand quite close to each other and, as soon as the ball hits the turf, will come together in a wrestle for the five or six seconds it takes for the ball to fall back down to them. What change have we made? Not bloody much!

And we can’t wait to see how precise and precious the umpires are going to be about what constitutes a touch.

For boundary throw ins, the situation is much the same. As the ball is arcing through the air for five or six seconds, the ruckmen will be wrestling for position and advantage as they move to the fall of the ball. Again, not much bloody difference!

We can’t fault the intent of these experiments, but they don’t go nearly far enough.

AFL Umpiring boss Jeff Gieschen has been rolled out after the Grand Final to perform his verbal pirouettes again, this time over the goal/behind to the Barcodes’ Sharrod Wellingham. Once more, the spectre of video referrals of goal umpiring decisions has been raised, even though the 2010 pre-season trial of the process was, in AussieRulesBlog’s view, an unmitigated waste of time.

But the big issue we should be focussing on is buried at the end of Gieschen’s statement on the matter. Discussing the process the on-field umpires went through in coming to the decision, he says:

"Our field umpire (Shaun Ryan) actually asked the two boundary umpires, who were both on the posts, what they thought [and] they couldn't add anything.
"He then asked the other field umpires.
"It would have been probably nice if we had gone back to the goal umpire as well."

So, was the decision made by the field umpire or the goal umpire? Why would it have been nice to go back to the goal umpire? Did the field umpire signal All Clear with two hands, suggesting a goal? Did the goal umpire change his decision on that basis?

Regardless, AussieRulesBlog thinks there’s far too much emphasis on mistakes by goal umpires. The error rate is minute. Both Chris Dawes and Tom Hawkins had gimme opportunities to score goals — and missed. Why aren’t we focussing on those incidents?

And if Gieschen is so damned worried about getting it as right as it can possibly be, what about looking at a consistent interpretation and application of the laws of the game from the first bounce of pre-season to the final siren of the Grand Final? Now THAT would be a step forward!

Release the Giesch!!!!!

"The good thing for us as umpires is nothing changes. Free kicks are the same." says AFL umpire Shaun Ryan, one of the three umpires chosen to officiate at Saturday’s AFL Grand Final.

If only that were so, Shaun. If only it were so.

FWIW, AussieRulesBlog reckons Shaun is one of the best of the whistleblowers running around.

Release the Giesch!!!

We don’t think we’re being pedantic expecting that a foundation rule of Aussie Rules football be adhered to in the game’s elite competition. Actually, there were any number of rules not adhered to in watching the four finals this weekend, but we’ve got one in particular on our mind.

Despite repeated emphatic denials by AFL executives, further evidence tonight in the North-Carlton game that there is a Rule of the Week.

Tonight, for the first time in our recollection, players caught with the ball and punching it to indicate "a genuine attempt to get rid of the ball" were penalised because they were, to quote the umpires, "punching the ball to themselves". We heard this from two separate umpires, so it has to be assumed it is an instruction rather than an idiosyncratic expression.

We don't have a problem with this new interpretation in general, but there are caveats. If the ball is being held in by an opponent, there should be no free kick.

Our big problem with the interpretation is that it hasn't applied previously in this season. The rule has to be that a free kick interpretation for round one of the pre-season is exactly the same as the free kick interpretation in the last thirty seconds of the Grand Final. This interpretation has appeared out of nowhere for round 19. It's just not good enough.

Release the Giesch!!!!

Not for the first time, AussieRulesBlog is moved to address the issue of incidental contact in the context of free kicks.

In an incident we noticed in the West Coast–Dockers game yesterday, a player dived toward the ball and initiated contact with an opponent’s legs. The umpire paid a free kick for high contact. This is hardly an isolated example and it’s an issue we’ve visited previously.

In the recent West Coast–Geelong game, a number of free kicks were paid in ruck contests for what was clearly incidental illegal contact yet obvious holding by the ruckmen was allowed because, according to the umpire, both players were holding. We commented recently on the application of the rules to ruck contests.

Now, we’re struck by the logical inconsistency of a position where one player is penalised for a contact he did not initiate and could not avoid, yet other players are not penalised for clear and obvious breaches. And let’s make it clear that this is not an issue about umpiring performance — it’s about the rules and the way umpires are instructed to interpret them.

Recently, discussing the sling tackle issue, we suggested a player making incidental contact with an opponent’s boot as a result of a sling tackle would not result in the opponent being penalised for kicking, yet incidental contact with the ground was regarded by the MRP as high contact in determining Jack Trengove’s guilt. Another logical inconsistency.

There’s an underlying issue here. Zero-tolerance policies are populist responses to complex issues. They’re also highly likely to generate exceptions. And make no mistake — the intent of the rules and interpretations in relation to high contact and hands-in-the-back is zero tolerance. That is, any and every breach will be penalised regardless of intent.

We don’t think anyone can have an argument with the general proposition that players’ heads should be protected as effectively as we can do so. If a player cops a clothesline tackle or a whack to the head or a bump that connects with the currently-defined area for high contact, we generally have no issue with free kicks.

But what we see every week is tiny, insignificant, incidental high contacts being free kicked.

When the hands-in-the-back interpretation of the push in the back rule was introduced, the umpires were clearly under instruction to establish a baseline for acceptable contact. A player flexing a pinky finger in the same postcode as his opponent’s back was free kicked. Now we’re seeing a more relaxed interpretation on most occasions with only occasional over-zealousness.

We don’t think a zero tolerance approach works — in anything. As soon as discretion to consider context is removed, injustices, both large and small, are an inevitable consequence.

What’s the solution? Borrowing from the MRP’s assessment criteria, if the action that causes contact to an opponent, be it high contact or hands in the back, is intentional, reckless or negligent — that is, if the player could reasonably expect that taking that action could result in illegal contact — then pay the free kick. If it is incidental, play on. This arrangement would require umpires to make an on-the-spot judgement of players’ actions, which they do with deliberate out-of-bounds and deliberate rushed behind now (but perhaps we could provide some better guidance than is currently provided?).

This isn’t a perfect schema, but we liken it to the legal system. It’s better that nine guilty people go free than that an innocent person is convicted. In football terms, we’d rather nine free kicks be missed than that an incidental contact be free kicked.

Does AFL House talk with the umpiring department? At all? We don’t think we’ll be alone in being startled by the latest pronouncement on the sling tackle issue.

This time, it’s Football Operations honcho Adrian Anderson weighing in:

AFL football operations manager Adrian Anderson says Melbourne's Jack Trengove should have had a free kick paid against him for a tackle many thought would be cited by the match review panel.

. . .

Anderson said a 'rough conduct' free kick should be paid for instances of sling tackles or players being unnecessarily driven into the ground in a tackle, regardless of whether such incidents were considered reportable at the time by the umpires.

He said examples of the rule have been included on an educational DVD sent out each year to explain rule interpretations, going back to 2008.

Sorry, Adrian, but the last time we recall an umpire paying a rough conduct free kick* for a player being slung or driven into the ground in an otherwise legal tackle was when we were watching Noah catch the animals before boarding the ark.

Readers of recent posts won’t be surprised that AussieRulesBlog welcomes Anderson’s announcement. It’s just that it’s so out of kilter with what we’ve got used to seeing from The Giesch’s boys.

Well, at least we know now. Prepare for a zero-tolerance blitz on heavy tackles for the next few weeks!!

————

*For the keen, the rough conduct free kick is at 15.4.5 (l) in the 2011 AFL Laws of the Game booklet.

Here at AussieRulesBlog Central we were forcing ourselves to watch the Bombers go down to North again and we noticed, at the start of the third quarter, an umpire call back a player-initiated advantage because “there’s no advantage”. We’re pretty sure we’ve seen this in another game some time over the past couple of weekends too.

As we noted in our Focus on Rules II: Advantage post, for the 2011 season the Law was rewritten to incorporate player-initiated advantage and the provision for the umpire to call the ball back where there is no advantage (17.3.2) was removed.

We don’t know why we’re surprised, but there seems to have been a change in the way this Law is being implemented in the last couple of weeks. We can only assume that The Giesch has seen the criticism and responded in the only way he knows how — by changing the level playing field while the game is being played!

Jeff, is there even the faintest chance that we could see a Law interpreted in the same way for one whole season? This really is beyond a joke.

Release the Giesch!!!!

Many would suggest that fifty metres is too harsh a penalty for many of the occasions where it is imposed. It cannot be doubted that some of the more gamesmanship-oriented infringements have been eradicated since the fifty-metre penalty was introduced for time wasting. AussieRulesBlog has moments of clear analysis that the harshness of the penalty works, and then there are those occasions when our own team suffers for some seemingly insignificant indiscretion!

Here’s the Law from the 2011 Laws of Football booklet:

18. Fifty-metre penalty

If player-initiated advantage is the ugliest Law in the litter, then deliberate rushed behind is perhaps the most mis-understood.

15.7 Free kicks — Deliberate rushed behind 
15.7.1 when awarded
A free kick shall be awarded against a player from the defending team who intentionally kicks, handballs or forces the football over the attacking team’s goal line or behind line or onto one of the attacking team’s goal posts. In assessing whether a free kick should be awarded under this Law, the field umpire shall give the benefit of the doubt to the defender.

15.7.2 taking free kick
A free kick awarded under Law 15.7.1 shall be taken at the point where the football crossed the goal line or behind line or from the relevant goal post.

This Law was introduced in the wake of what AussieRulesBlog is pleased to call the Bowden Manoeuvre, although it could equally have been called the Guerra Manoeuvre. In the Bowden instance, Richmond’s Joel Bowden handballed the ball through for a point rather than kick out to a contest after a behind — repeatedly. The Tigers were battling to forestall an Essendon come-from-behind victory. Bowden figured, correctly under the rules at the time, that the point he conceded was a smaller penalty than the goal that the Bombers may have created on a turnover from his kickout.

In the Guerra instance, Hawthorn’s Brent Guerra, in a similar circumstance to Bowden, went a step further — we use that term advisedly! — to actually step over the goal line and conceded a point rather than take a kick in after a behind to a disadvantageous situation — again repeatedly.

This Law is quite clear: the umpire is required to judge whether the ball crossing the goal line or hitting the posts was the intention of the defender. Not a lot of grey there — until The Giesch got hold of it.

Under the interpretation currently being peddled by the umpires at the behest of The Giesch and his cronies, a defender who is ‘under pressure’ is permitted to intentionally force the ball over the goal line or onto a goal post — in direct contravention of the Law as written. We wonder whether the Rules Committee created the interpretation at the same time as the rule? In either case, the umpire has to assess either intent or pressure, both very subjective judgements.

The reason we’ve picked this rule is the level of misunderstanding of the interpretation that was to be employed. Despite the AFL releasing a short video demonstrating what would be considered deliberate and what wouldn’t, there was widespread confusion, largely fed by assumption rather than knowledge or research.

Since this Law was introduced, for the 2009 season, we think it has worked pretty well. The Bowden/Guerra manoeuvre, the real target of the Law, has been totally eliminated from the game and defenders have slightly fewer options when close to goal. There have been some notably poor decisions, but given the number of times there is potential for a ruling to be made, those clangers have been mercifully few.

If 2011 has been notable for anything, it has been the slow-motion car crash that is the revised Advantage law. Continuing our Focus on Rules series, AussieRulesBlog looks at the Advantage rule.

Once again, we’ve found new respect for the on-field officials after reading these laws carefully. We hope you’ll gain a new appreciation for the difficulties of their task and the complexities of the laws they are exercising during games.

Here is the Law as it has appeared over the past four years. The (colour) key is:

Black: from 2008 (earliest electronic Laws of Football we could locate).

Red: Inserted 2009.

Blue: Added 2011.

Strikethrough: removed 2011.

The crucial changes, fairly obviously, are those made to Law 17.3. It’s worth noting that the change has removed the umpire’s discretion to call the ball back if advantage doesn’t eventuate — a provision that was available until the 2011 change.

AussieRulesBlog has noted on a number of occasions that “advantage” is quite unsuited to Australian Rules football. Our umpires are schooled, right from the beginning, to blow the whistle when they see an infringement. Players are schooled, right from the beginning, to stop on hearing the whistle. So fundamental has the notion to stop on the whistle been that umpires have been instructed, prior to 2011, to award fifty-metre penalties — based on the “time wasting” provision — against players continuing on with their actions after the whistle.

Into this long-standing tenet of the game, the AFL introduces player-initiated advantage. Players may now play on — as it were — after the whistle, provided they are sure their team is receiving the free kick. In a paradox, if the player continuing on with play gets it wrong, the fifty-metre “time wasting” penalty is still available to the umpire. For the most part, umpires have dealt with this paradox with admirable commonsense.

It’s also worth noting that explanations from The Giesch about controversial advantage decisions have prominently featured the notion that play must be continuous for player-initiated advantage to apply. It’s abundantly clear, reading the new Law 17.3 above, that this is not codified in the Law and is simply a matter of interpretation. The Giesch has been snowing us — again! Any number of advantage situations, especially inside forward 50s, have featured clearly stopped play with one opportunist taking a punt — clearly, to our mind, outside of the spirit of the game even if in sync with the Law as written.

We must note that in other football codes, referees hold the whistle in an advantage situation to see if the advantage plays out. If it doesn’t, the whistle is blown and play returns to the site of the penalty/foul.

The new law 17.3 is a dog and no-one will be surprised if it is euthanased at the conclusion of the season. AussieRulesBlog would go further and remove advantage from our game completely. The vagaries are too large and the penalties too harsh against the other team. Please Adrian and Rules Committee, put this abomination of a law out of our misery!

Edited — see clarification below.

Serendipity is always unexpected — perhaps it’s in its nature to be so. Recently, AussieRulesBlog has been having a slightly agitated online discussion on some aspects of the rules of Aussie Rules. As part of that discussion, we made the observation that the vast majority of the crowds we share stadiums with appear to have only a passing acquaintance with the rules of the game if we can take the almost maniacal shouting of “Baaallllllll!!” as any indication.

As a result, we had resolved to do a series of posts on various aspects of the rules with a view to doing our bit to improve general understanding of them and thus, somewhat contrary to our reputation, also do our bit to moderate some of the criticism directed at umpires at the elite level.

The serendipity comes in as we watched Foxtel’s broadcast of the Bulldogs-Hawthorn game yesterday evening. Brian Taylor expressed a view on an umpiring decision that was completely at odds with the rule that we had, only a day or two beforehand, considered in some detail. We don’t think it’s making too big a leap to suggest that most footy fans get their knowledge of the rules and their interpretation from TV broadcasts — whether it be the audio from umpires which is broadcast or the comments of those providing the TV commentary.

So, here goes with our first foray into developing a better understanding of the rules of the game. We’re going to start with one of the most contentious areas of the game: holding the ball.

Here’s the relevant rules, direct from Laws of Australian Football 2011 (including weird capitalisation!):

15.2.3 holding the football — Prior opportunity/No Prior opportunity
Where the field Umpire is satisfied that a Player in possession of the football:

(a) has had a prior opportunity to dispose of the football, the field Umpire shall award a Free Kick against that Player if the Player does not Kick or Handball the football immediately when they are Correctly Tackled; or
(b) has not had a prior opportunity to dispose of the football, the field Umpire shall award a Free Kick against that Player if, upon being Correctly Tackled, the Player does not Correctly Dispose or attempt to Correctly Dispose of the football after being given a reasonable opportunity to do so.

15.2.4 application — specific Instances where Play shall continue
For the avoidance of doubt, the field Umpire shall allow play to continue when:
(a) a Player is bumped and the football falls from the Player’s hands;
(b) a Player’s arm is knocked which causes the Player to lose possession of the football;
(c) a Player’s arms are pinned to their side by an opponent which causes the Player to drop the football, unless the Player has had a prior opportunity to Correctly Dispose of the football, in which case Law 15.2.3 (a) shall apply;
(d) a Player, whilst in the act of Kicking or Handballing, is swung off-balance and does not make contact with the football by either foot or hand, unless the Player has had a prior opportunity to Correctly Dispose of the football, in which case Law 15.2.3 (a) shall apply; or
(e) a Player is pulled or swung by one arm which causes the football to fall from the Player’s hands, unless the Player has had a prior opportunity to Correctly Dispose of the football, in which case Law 15.2.3 (a) shall apply.

15.3.1 correct disposal
A Player Correctly Disposes of the football if the Player Kicks or Handballs the football.

AussieRulesBlog hopes the “clarification” of the advantage rule provided to AFL clubs is more effective that the version posted to the AFL website.

We don’t feel any wiser than we did before seeing this “clarification”. And beyond providing a justification for Barcodes supporters to claim, “We woz robbed!”, we’re not quite sure what has been clarified.

Still, the player-initiated advantage rule does have an element of pure luck about it which is perfectly in keeping with the game’s addiction to gambling sponsorship at the moment.

Umpires and tribunals are a necessary part of our game. Without them, the game we Aussie Rules aficionados love would be little more than a brawl in a paddock. So, with that responsibility, it’s verging on disastrous that footy officialdom is so out of touch with practical reality.

Few would argue that the out of bounds on the full and deliberate out of bounds rules have generally improved the game as a spectacle. Few also would argue that there are countless occasions in each game where players ‘deliberately’ take the ball over the boundary line where there is no practical means for them to stop or otherwise keep the ball in play.

Jeff Gieschen’s spin on the Montagna kick last Thursday is as pure an example as could be imagined of defending the indefensible. If that kick is penalised, then every player who crosses the boundary while ‘fumbling’ the ball must also be penalised.

To add to the AFL’s woes, the MRP decides that Matthew Scarlett’s headcrashing elbow is a "legitimate spoiling action" that caused "accidental" high contact. For goodness sake! The only accidental contact was the contact Scarlett made with the ball!

Worse, the MRP’s analysis of Scarlett’s actions brings into question the whole rationale for free kicks paid for incidental contact. Surely these too should be deemed “accidental” and free of penalty?

Both the MRP and the umpiring department have utterly lost the confidence of the paying customer. The game may appear to be healthy after a bumper round of tight and interesting games, but umpiring and tribunal decisions that defy common logic risk the game’s ongoing health.

Release the Giesch!!!  . . .and the MRP!