Adelaide will appeal against the three-match ban given to forward Shane McAdam as the fallout continues from the first-round flashpoint.
The Crows on Wednesday morning were quick to lodge an appeal with the AFL after McAdam expressed disappointment with his three-match suspension.
McAdam was banned for rough conduct for his bump on GWS’ Jacob Wehr. An appeal hearing is likely on Thursday evening.
McAdam’s ban follows a two-game suspension for Melbourne’s Kysaiah Pickett for a similar bump which felled Western Bulldog Bailey Smith.
The Crows, in their defence of McAdam at Tuesday night’s tribunal hearing, used video of Pickett’s hit.
Shane McAdam. (Photo by Mark Brake/Getty Images)
The star Demon accepted a ban and avoided a tribunal hearing, with his bump graded by match review officer Michael Christian on a lower scale than McAdam’s.
Tribunal chairman Jeff Gleeson, when announcing McAdam’s ban, noted the Pickett bump.
“There appears to be a slightly more glancing aspect to the impact than occurred here,” he said.
“If we are wrong about that, we note that the guidelines say that we are not bound by the examples.
“And it ought not be assumed that we would necessarily grade impact in the Pickett matter as high impact, and not severe.”
Adelaide’s dual premiership captain Mark Bickley demanded league hierarchy explain “mind-boggling” inconsistency between the cases.
“It’s go to be someone of weight to explain to the football public what they’re going to do to make sure something like this, where two instances happen, almost identical, and we get different results,” Bickley told SEN radio.
“I wouldn’t be unhappy if Pickett and McAdam got three (games).
“It’s really about consistency and that’s where people … get upset with the tribunal because we’re comparing it to what happened six months ago – so you can imagine how upset people are when you compare it to something that happened one day ago.
“That is the thing that makes everyone put their hands in the air: how can we have inconsistency between things that happened so close together?
“It’s mind-boggling.”
Adelaide’s Tom Duggan QC told the tribunal there was no severe head contact when McAdam chiefly made contact with Wehr’s chest and shoulder, dispossessing the Giant of the ball.
“In that sense, it’s entirely legitimate for a bump to be made … it’s perfectly fine,” Duggan told the hearing.
“This is clearly not a high bump because it doesn’t in any way involve the head.
“Yes it was a tough bump but … it was entirely fair.”
Simon Goodwin’s strong advice to his Melbourne players is now an order – don’t bump.
Kysaiah Pickett’s two-week rough conduct ban for his high hit on Western Bulldogs opponent Bailey Smith has highlighted Goodwin’s belief that the bump is dead in the AFL.
“From my perspective, I think it is,” Goodwin said. “There’s always the way you use your body with your shoulder in contest situations, but not in a bumping sense.
“Our game is about tackling, there’s no need to bump. I think it is dead, yeah.”
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It is the third-straight March where Goodwin has said in the wake of a high-profile bumping incident that his players should eradicate bumping from their game.
Kysaiah Pickett. (Photo by Albert Perez/AFL Photos via Getty Images)
Only this time, he was even more adamant. “There is no element in the game where we should be bumping,” he said.
“It just puts you in a situation that you don’t want to be in. We certainly won’t be encouraging our players to bump. We want them to tackle, we want them to play tough, contested footy.”
Goodwin said Pickett and his teammates were reminded about the matter in the wake of his suspension.
“It’s obviously an incident we don’t like to see,” he said. “I was asked after the game whether I’d speak to Kosi about the way he plays – I’m certainly not going to talk to him about the way he plays.
“I love the pressure he puts on, I love the intensity he plays with. But I did speak to our playing group, and Kosi was involved in that, about the bump.”
Goodwin said the game is played on instinct and bumps occasionally will still happen, but it is clear the consequences are too risky.
“We’ve spoken for a couple of years now about the bump. For a few years now the AFL has been pretty clear that if you choose to bump, there could be a situation in that you don’t want to find yourself as a player,” he said.
“So we’ll try to limit that risk where we can – we want our player to tackle … we want them to play tough, but we don’t want them to bump in any situation that they don’t need to be bumping in. Kosi knows that, Kosi knows he’s probably got it wrong. Thankfully Bailey Smith was in a good place after the game and wasn’t concussed.
But Goodwin does not see the need for the AFL to introduce a sin bin for such incidents.
“It just adds another complexity to the game that we don’t need … it just provides a bit more fuel for something to go wrong,” he said.
Collingwood can’t confirm a timeline on Jeremy Howe’s return from a serious arm injury but the star defender has assured coach Craig McRae he expects to make a swift recovery.
McRae revealed he spoke to Howe before he had surgery to repair his fractured arm on Saturday, the defender claiming he was “a good bone-healer” before he went under the knife.
Howe suffered the injury in a marking-contest collision with Geelong’s Tyson Stengle in the Magpies’ opening-round win against Geelong. “I went to the hospital and saw him early in the morning and he was still in his footy shorts and about to have an operation … he actually said he’s a great bone-healer, I don’t know what that means,” McRae told Fox Footy.
“We’re not in a position to make comment yet, there’s still a bit to play out … we’ll know more in a couple of weeks. He’s left hospital today and we’ll assess in the couple of weeks where that’s at.
“We love him enormously and we want to make sure he’s OK.”
McRae responded to a News Corp column suggesting Howe had a duty of care to Stengle, who was running back with the flight of the ball before the defender made contact with his knee.
It was claimed Howe’s actions could have “busted” Stengle’s jaw and cheekbone and left him with long-term brain issues.
“I read that with interest I must admit … it’s the instincts of the player, you’re asking a player not to attack the footy hard,” McRae said. “He’s one of the greatest exponents of the aerial part of our game.
“So you’re asking don’t run and launch at the ball, that’s something that’s really difficult to do. We’re taught this as kids … go with the ball hard, the ball is your focus. You watch the footage, the ball was always his focus.”
Port Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley says his side’s impressive round-one win has done little to change his outlook as speculation swirls around his future at the club.
Hinkley’s contract is up at the end of the season and Port president David Koch insists no call will be made until the end of the year, leaving the 10-year coach to sweat it out and deal with constant pressure.
The club has previously declared reaching finals as the minimum expectation, something that looked more than achievable in a 54-point smashing of Brisbane on Saturday.
But asked if the win helped his capacity to do his job and deal with external speculation, Hinkley answer was simple.
“Not really, that doesn’t really bother me,” he told Fox Footy.
“The club and myself, we’ve certainly set the scene for what this year looks like for us and then what happens throughout the season, that will be determined by a whole season and the results of the whole season.
“Whatever happens at the end we’re both comfortable with where that sits.”
But Hinkley admitted it was a vital win for the mood of the group, showing their pre-season grind season was putting them on the right path.
“I can’t sit here tonight and say it doesn’t make a big difference. You start your season full of optimism and you want to make sure you get away to a good start,” he said.
“We were very comfortable that our pre-season was really strong, but the one game we displayed on television suggested a little bit different.
“It makes a massive difference to the group when they walk in … we had a pretty big build-up for the game, and we needed to get it right.”
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