Six Points: The fundamental flaw in ump dissent rule, Cats in crisis, and Jamarra a chance to right footy's wrongs

A Derby, a Showdown, a 150th anniversary bonanza, some sweet revenge and an iconic photo made Round 3 a week of celebrations for the AFL – that is, of course, unless you’re a tipster.

Once again, upsets pockmarked the round, from injury-hit Melbourne and St Kilda overcoming the loss of their captains for stirring triumphs at the MCG, to a Showdown stunner from an inspired Adelaide, and, of course, Gold Coast torching Geelong to set alarm bells off at the Cattery.

Who’d have thought Hawthorn would get a win before the Cats? Sam Mitchell got the last laugh over Alastair Clarkson after a week of criticism, ending North Melbourne’s golden run in style to hopefully put to bed accusations of tanking for good.

West Coast pushed Freo all the way with 10 men left (this is only a slight exaggeration), Carlton won the ugliest game of footy you’ll see, and Blake Acres somehow got a week – or as I’m going to call that ban for the rest of the year, ‘half a Kozzie’ – for the most innocuous of high bumps.

The Cats are dead last, the Saints are undefeated, the umpire dissent rule is a talking point again and the most improved player in the league just bunged his shoulder – so once again, there’s plenty to unpack! Let’s get into it.

1. Umpire dissent rule has a fatal, unfixable flaw

From the moment it was introduced at the start of last year, the umpire dissent crackdown has generated more controversy than any other rule.

So it is again this week, with the key talking point out of Round 3 the crucial call to ping Stephen Coniglio and gift Carlton a crucial goal during their narrow win over GWS.

This was everything the average punter hates seeing out of footy – a touchy, contentious decision close to goal in the dying stages of a thrilling game. It’s manna from heaven for talkback radio and footy panel shows.

The problem with the rule, as it has been from the outset, is that it is impossible to be consistent about it. Every umpire is going to have a different threshold for what constitutes dissent.

We saw, only a minute after Coniglio was penalised, Mitch McGovern likewise put his arms out to plea for a free kick, with the officiating umpire (correctly) ignoring it; then, that evening, Jack Higgins nearly burst a blood vessel at the MCG without conceding.

Umpires have a hard enough time with the multitude of other, constantly changing rules they have to officiate throughout the fastest-moving sport on the planet.

Now they not only have to decide whether a player ducked to initiate high contact or not, whether a player had enough prior opportunity before dropping the ball, or whether a player’s kick was close enough to a teammate to not ping him for insufficient intent; they have to also decide whether a tired player’s feedback was harsh enough to warrant a game-changing free kick.

Of course there are going to be mistakes. Of course there is going to be controversy. Umpire Craig Fleer is as much a victim as the Giants players; he made a brave decision believing he was following the AFL’s constantly changing guidelines, and as a result has had to deal with a cavalcade of abuse and criticism from media talking heads and everyday supporters alike.

Umpire participation is a major issue at grassroots level, and you can’t fault the AFL for trying to fix the problem. But the number of umpires at that level pushed out of the game by abuse is a significant minority – 6 per cent according to a Tweet by Tom Morris – and having played and watch plenty of local footy, my experience is that abuse from over the fence by spectators is an even more rampant issue at that level of the game than by the players involved.

Those same spectators are also the ones going along to the footy and watching their team get punished with a goal for raising their hands, or pointing at the scoreboard, or looking at the umpire. Forget addressing that problem – the dissent rule is only further demonising umpires in the eyes of the angry mob.

Everyone agrees we need to get abuse of umpires out of the game – the two calls against Sydney players for abuse on Sunday against Melbourne were far less controversial, though mostly because they were in the early stages of the match rather than at a critical juncture.

But currently, the AFL is getting even more militant about it than rugby union, where a cursory glance at a referee can get you sent off. In attempting to fix the problem, the AFL have created another one – and it’s only leading to more abuse for the umpires, and giving them more of a say in deciding the outcome of games.

The AFL have dithered around this for 12 months, dragging back the rules whenever controversy has reared and then cautiously reinstating most of them when no one is looking. That’s as much of a disservice to the umpires as anything – oh, we don’t like players abusing you, but what we don’t like even more is people getting mad about us trying to stop players abusing you.

The rules won’t be walked back – to do so would basically open the gates at every level for players and supporters to do as they please. So I guess all there is to do is watch nervously, hope the players adjust quickly, and pray it’s not your team on the receiving end of the next dodgy one.

Jesse Hogan of the Giants appeals to the umpire. (Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)

2. Um… what’s up with the Cats?

We all tipped Geelong to be 0-3 and last on the ladder, right?

I wrote last week that there was no need for the Cats to panic – they’re famously slow starters, had several big names coming off interrupted pre-seasons, and had nothing to prove in the early rounds.

That’s still true – but the signs are getting alarming. The Cats were taken apart by an inspired Gold Coast on Sunday afternoon, and in the end a 19-point margin flattered them.

The absence of Joel Selwood as a midfield enforcer was telling; Geelong were never a dominant stoppage team last year, but a 39-23 clearance shellacking marks the second week in a row their engine room has been comprehensively beaten. Patrick Dangerfield basically did it all himself for three quarters with some quite remarkable desperation, but when he flagged in the last quarter there was nobody around to step up for him.

The Suns, it must be said, were fantastic – their electric, Collingwood-esque ball movement was perfectly designed to catch the Cats on the counterattack, and while it wasn’t always perfect, it worked more than enough to put a winning score on the board.

Matt Rowell was a stoppage beast with nine clearances and 18 contested possessions, Lachie Weller’s game-breaking pace and ball use was delightful across half-back, and Darcy Macpherson completely blanketed Tyson Stengle while winning 24 touches himself.

At the other end, Jack Lukosius’ five-goal haul, after a week of criticism for his defensive efforts, showcased that he’s still one of the best kicks in the game. And forget the debate about wingers in the All-Australian team; the new debate is whether pressure forwards should get a blazer, because if they should, Nick Holman will need to book a trip to the tailor.

But teams appear to have worked the Cats out, and for the first time there are now question marks over some of their most experienced campaigners.

Tom Hawkins is playing like a man who missed the entire pre-season after foot surgery, and probably needs either a run in the VFL or some time off entirely to get himself right – he’s a liability at the moment. Mark Blicavs just isn’t having the same impact around the ball as he was last year; Zach Tuohy is no longer a reliable user off half-back; Dangerfield isn’t running out games with his usual power.

Were it not for Jeremy Cameron, things would be grimmer still. The Cats are the first reigning premier since 1976 to start 0-3, and just three teams since 2010 have played finals after a similarly bad start.

There’s ample time to recover, and you’d back the Cats to do just that – but they’re already a long way off the pace for a fifth consecutive top-four berth, and with it a precious double chance for a side that remains older than most.

Easter Monday against Hawthorn is next, and it’s now by no means an easy kill: the Hawks’ speedy ball movement will trouble the Cats if they’re not at their best, and Sam Mitchell’s men did stun them in the corresponding fixture 12 months ago.

If you think there’s cause for alarm now, just wait for the reaction if the Cats are 0-4!

3. What was up with Sunday’s fixturing?

For more than a decade now, the AFL’s Sunday timeslots have remained, mostly, the same: 1:10pm for the early game, 3:20 for the mid-afternoon Channel 7 one, and 4:40 for the twilight round finale.

It’s a perfectly solid block – I’m not alone in thinking that early game should be brought an hour forward and the twilight one pushed an hour back, especially for Western Australian games, so that footy nuffs like me can watch every game with practically no overlap.

But for some bizarre reason, the AFL chose to shake it up for Round 3, with Gold Coast and Geelong’s early match starting at 2:10pm instead. And I can’t for the life of me figure out why.

The game was played on the Gold Coast, so daylight saving as an excuse is out – Queensland don’t go in for that nonsense. Indeed, that just makes it more baffling: the first bounce came down with every body clock in Victoria, NSW and Tasmania at 3:10pm.

It meant many people, including me, had to choose whether to watch Melbourne take on Sydney or the final term of the Suns’ win over the Cats: if having the early game in the Sunday death slot wasn’t a killer enough for the Suns’ hopes of getting stacks of eyeballs on them, that’ll do it.

There are plenty more important things for the AFL to address, but this was just plain weird – and they did it a few times last year, too, for no apparent reason then either.

Fixing what ain’t broken is a constant problem for this sport, and this is yet another example.

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4. 2023’s most improved player is already locked in

A shoulder injury might wreck Mason Wood’s Brownlow chances, but his efforts over the first three rounds have made him a shoo-in for the title of the AFL’s biggest improver.

Wood has been an AFL-standard player for a while, doing some nice things when moved to a wing by Brett Ratten last year after years as a frustrating forward for both the Saints and North Melbourne, but his tenth season has just about already been a career year three games in!

The 29-year old has six Brownlow votes across the first nine years; he could easily have seven already in 2023, following up 20 touches and two goals against Fremantle and 24 and one against the Western Bulldogs with a career-high 27 (and another goal) to dominate Essendon.

For one of the game’s more maligned figures, it’s been remarkable to see how many elite attributes Wood has when fully flying. At 192 centimetres, he’s a sizeable man, but he covers the ground exceptionally well, particularly given the Saints have looked to go with pace off the turnover this year. With 24 marks across the first three rounds, he’s always been on offer for an outlet kick, or cutting off an opposition forward foray.

But equally impressive is that he uses his size to impact at the coalface, too: 14 contested possessions and eight clearances made him a weapon pushing into stoppages as an extra number around the ball against the Bombers.

On top of everything else, he has the perfect surname for enraptured Saints fans to make crude innuendos praising him.

Out of nowhere, Wood has become a crucial piece of the puzzle for a Saints outfit putting something very nice together. It’s a crying shame he’ll now be sidelined for surely at least a few weeks with an AC joint knock, but if Ross Lyon could find a way to cover for Jack Steele, surely finding a stop-gap on the wing isn’t too much to ask.

5. ANZAC Day guernseys have officially gone too far

Of all the wretched jumpers Hawthorn have worn over the years, this might be the most offensive.

The only positive thing I have to say about it is it seems to have become the straw that has broken the camel’s back in terms of accepting a concerning trend in the game: ANZAC Day tributes extending into merchandise.

There’s something very icky to me, and many others, about clubs making custom guernseys to honour our fallen soldiers, and then making a tidy sum selling them. Sure, a portion of the fees are donated to the ANZAC Appeal – for Essendon and Collingwood, anyway – but it’s notable that the wording used is ‘portion of profits‘ rather than ‘all proceeds’ or even ‘all money made’.

What was once a one-off match to honour the ANZACs – one done superbly with The Last Post played to a deathly silent MCG – has become a round, with every team wanting their chance at saluting. I’d argue it’s over the top, with the exception of non-Victorian clubs, Fremantle especially, wanting to perform their own tributes – I’m not sure the Australians who stepped on the beach at Gallipoli felt overly strongly about an ANZAC Day Eve match.

ANZAC Day is supposed to be just that – a day out of our busy lives where we stop and reflect on the horrors of war and the sacrifices of our ancestors, and vow to never repeat it.

If anything, glorifying it with a whole round of footy and splashing it on every sign and every bit of merchandise is the opposite of the quite contemplation and melancholy I’d argue is the spirit of the day.

6. Jamarra gives footy a chance to write its wrongs

Jamarra Ugle-Hagan’s defiant point at his skin after a goal against Brisbane, following the shameful racial abuse he suffered the weekend prior, will take some beating as the most iconic footy moment of the season.

Jamarra Ugle-Hagan of the Western Bulldogs points to his skin as he celebrates kicking a goal. (Photo by Daniel Pockett/Getty Images)

Hopefully the image above, and his stirring five-goal haul on the night, won’t be the only thing that creates a lasting impact. Because Ugle-Hagan’s post-match interview and press conference were just as important – particularly what he said about our responsibility as fans to call out racism where we see it.

“I just want to see someone point them out instead of me having to contact the club and saying this happened,” Ugle-Hagan said after the Bulldogs’ win.

“I’d rather someone in the [crowd] point it out and tell them, let them know that it’s not the right thing to say.

“That goes with any race, not just with Aboriginals and Indigenous boys and girls.”

So that’s what I’ll be doing here. While the majority of the reaction to Ugle-Hagan’s gesture was gladdening, and the collective disgust at the racists who instigated it a strong sign, we’ve still got a long way to go to eradicate racism from the game.

What was particularly disappointing to see on the cesspits of Twitter and Facebook comments sections wasn’t more racism – people seem to save the truly horrific stuff for the relative privacy of Instagram DMs these days. But there were far too many of the usual complaints about keeping politics out of sport, or focussing on football, or suggestions that Ugle-Hagan should just suck it up because everyone cops abuse of some sort.

“What ever happened to sticks and stones can break my bones but names can never hurt me,” was one comment I saw.

“Why doesn’t the AFL integrity stamp out this devisive type of act? Why make such a ridiculous statement? We know what colour his skin is. This is as offensive as the spear throwing war dance we have seen before. No need for this in sport,” was another.

None of this is racism, so you won’t see life bans handed out for it, or people calling them out. But it’s exactly this attitude that allows racism to propagate, and makes anyone, Indigenous or otherwise, who dares to call it out a divisive figure.

That’s how it started with Adam Goodes, ten years ago: after being the victim of racial abuse from a young fan, he was mercilessly attacked by the usual suspects, who made wild and inaccurate statements all but accusing him of being a bully.

Those malicious seeds grew, and resulted in the rampant, weekly booing that saw a champion footballer and great Australian hounded from our game. Indifference to racial abuse, and offence at calling it out, created a monster, and the greatest disgrace of footy’s modern era.

I’ll make this simple: if your reaction to Jamarra Ugle-Hagan’s stance against racism is anything other than complete support, then you are part of the problem. If you have an issue with a young man showing pride in his skin colour, or would rather not hear about the racial abuse he copped, then you are part of the problem. If your reaction to racial abuse is to say that white players get abused too, then you are part of the problem. And if you would like it better if everyone just focussed on footy, then, you guessed it, you are part of the problem.

To butcher a common German saying, if there is one racist in a crowd of 50,000 and nobody calls them out, it’s a crowd of 50,000 racists.

There are always going to be lowlife racist scum out there – I’m not sure we can stop that, short of punishing them one by one when they rear their heads. But what we can do is address how many people are still out there with far too high a threshold for racism, because if we fix that, then maybe we can do what Ugle-Hagan urged us to, and call out every instance of racist abuse as it happens.

Jamarra Ugle-Hagan, and his stance, is a chance to redeem ourselves as a code from our Adam Goodes shame. Only time will tell whether we are capable of acting on it.

Random thoughts

– Some losses might as well be wins. West Coast pushing Fremantle all the way with a skeleton bench is clearly one of those.

– Why were West Coast made to wear a clash guernsey in the Derby when Richmond were given the all clear to wear their normal, mostly black strip against the black-and-white of Collingwood?

– It was disappointing to hear Josh Dunkley get booed on Thursday night. Have some respect for a premiership hero.

– Good to see Channel 7 have learned from the Buddy Franklin 100 goal camera debacle by not having a single shot of Jamarra’s stance.

– It’s getting hard to watch Dyson Heppell play at the moment.

– I swear the vision that’s getting thrown around of half-hearted Jason Horne-Francis efforts could be seen from half the players in the league if you were constantly on the lookout for them.

– How Izak Rankine didn’t win the Showdown Medal I’ll never know.