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It’s time the AFL delivered a formal apology. The more humbling and grovelling the better.
It should be delivered to all the members of football’s support base, particularly those who make critical calls to talkback radio, and it should also be directed – and this might be the most teeth-gritted part of all – to members of the media who have ever criticised the AFL over its judicial processes.
The apology wouldn’t have to be particularly extensive. In effect, it would need state no more than this: ‘The Australian Football League is deeply sorry that its layers of judicial process have been allowed to fall into disarray. It apologises to those who have criticised the process in recent decades whom it has characterised as nutters.’
We could all accept that. On one condition.
The condition is a sincere undertaking that a new start now be embarked upon. The objective would be a judicial process born of exhaustive re-appraisal, that is competently manned or womaned, totally uncompromised, totally transparent, and which is encouraged at all times, without exception, to deliver totally independent outcomes.
The above relates, of course, to the two cases which this week found their way to the AFL Tribunal. Both were botched so seriously – one by the Match Review Panel and one by the tribunal – that public faith in these bodies has been further eroded.
That the cases were botched is now not just the view of this or that commentator or talkback caller. The AFL itself made the acknowledgement in the case of Bachar Houli, having appealed the two-week suspension imposed on the Richmond defender on the grounds of a ‘manifestly inadequate’ penalty.
Meanwhile, the AFL Tribunal adjudged the MRP decision on Will Schofield as botched in that it overturned the earlier guilty finding on the West Coast defender.
(AAP Image/Tony McDonough)
So, how did it come to this? Is the job of judging on-field matters like these so difficult that such errors naturally occur? Is it once people are appointed to the applicable arms of the AFL’s judicial process, guaranteeing much public interest in their findings, that they lose their judgement? Or is there something more at play?
Regarding the first of these three questions, I don’t think – and I don’t think many people who follow the game would think – that the Schofield or Houli cases were particularly difficult ones. They shouldn’t have been botched. Which suggests questions two and three might have greater applicability.
So, is it the pressure brought to bear on people who aren’t practised judges that causes what in these instances were quite bizarre outcomes?
Perhaps. We should note that the controversial penalties imposed on Schofield and Houli were handed down by two different panels of three ex-footballers. Those who sit on the Match Review Panel have no legal expertise in their midst, while Tuesday night’s tribunal jury had a QC as its chairman. One member of the tribunal jury, Wayne Henwood, is a lawyer.
So, how did such a body as the tribunal make what has been roundly viewed as a misjudgement? And why is it that such an error doesn’t feel entirely unfamiliar?
Which leads to question three: is there something else at play?
There have always been conspiracy theories in relation to outcomes on MRP and tribunal cases, almost all of which are fuelled by football’s emotional crucible. Nevertheless, that the theories exist renders the purity of operation of the two judicial bodies absolutely vital.
The MRP’s closed-room functioning is inadequate in its lack of transparency and should be reviewed immediately. As for the tribunal, perhaps it is permanently conflicted: feeling a need to satisfy both the public and the AFL. The Prime Ministerial endorsement of a player might only add to that muddle.
(AAP Image/Julian Smith)
It’s an interesting confluence of events that these two outcomes should have occurred this week. For it was only a few days ago that Barry Hall admitted he shouldn’t have been allowed to play in the 2005 grand final. Hall had punched St Kilda’s Matt Maguire in the stomach in a preliminary final, an action which was scrutinised by what at that time was the recently constituted MRP.
The action of the Sydney co-captain was found not to have been intentional (which offers an interesting juxtaposition with this week’s finding that Bachar Houli had intentionally struck a player who was behind him). Hall’s punch, which felled Maguire, was assessed as being of ‘low impact’.
The one-week penalty thus imposed on him opened the door to a challenge at the tribunal. The latter body found that based on the definition of what is and isn’t ‘in play’, Hall was free to help Sydney win its first grand final in 72 years.
Big Bazza was right last week: he shouldn’t have been playing in that match. His story, though, is salutary. It’s the type of event that compromises public belief in the AFL’s system of justice and it’s time the league acknowledged that this is so and did something about it.