The AFL is becoming more diverse thanks to the rise of players with multicultural backgrounds - but more should be done
Multicultural round was changed in 2018 showing that the AFL have not been as committed to multiculturalism as they should be.
A reported rift between Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley and premiership defender Harry O’Brien overshadowed the build-up to Friday night’s AFL blockbuster between Carlton and Collingwood at the MCG.
O’Brien was left out of Collingwood’s side because of an ankle problem. However reports surfaced on Channel Nine’s The Footy Show on Thursday night that O’Brien had clashed with Buckley mid-week at a team meeting and hadn’t been seen at the club since.
O’Brien, who won premiership and All-Australian honours in 2010, has been granted personal leave for a few days and is expected to return to training on Monday.
“He’s got an ankle injury at the moment … anything else over and above that, we’d be dealing with that behind our four walls,” Collingwood’s forwards coach Matthew Lappin told Channel Ten on Friday night.
“I can’t go any further into that. Obviously he’s out of the team tonight and we’ll just focus on our 22 players out there tonight.”
O’Brien’s teammate Dale Thomas, who is also out of action with an ankle injury, said he had no knowledge of any so-called rift between coach and player.
“It’s a strange one. My Twitter was blowing up,” Thomas told radio 3AW.
Thomas said he had asked the club’s media department if he needed to be briefed on anything before he did media interviews on Friday and he was told ‘no’.
“I think he (O’Brien) has been given time to go away and rest that ankle and just freshen up,” Thomas said.
“I presume there were meetings,” added Thomas, who has been doing injury rehabilitation work away from the main group in recent weeks.
“I doubt there was anything out of the ordinary (in the meetings).”
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Multicultural round was changed in 2018 showing that the AFL have not been as committed to multiculturalism as they should be.
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