Red Light For Afl Red Card
The Age
Saturday April 19, 2008
AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou, Collingwood coach Mick Malthouse and Geelong counterpart Mark Thompson yesterday rejected calls to introduce a send-off rule or red-card system for players who commit violent acts on the field, such as Barry Hall's king-hit on Eagle Brent Staker last Saturday night.
After he received a seven-match suspension for his hit on Staker, Hall wrote in his column in The Age that a send-off rule should be introduced, but Thompson disagreed, saying to change a rule after one incident would be "silly"."I don't like impulsive change of rules and this would have to be - any change of rules - should be well and truly debated, thought out, communicated . . . and I think just to change it on one punch would be quite silly," he said yesterday.Demetriou told Fairfax Radio that the league has previously considered implementing a send-off rule, but due to the infrequent nature of such cases, there was no need to bring it in."We have considered it before," Demetriou said. "If what happened the other day became something we started to see regularly, of course we would consider it."It works in other sports and has been used to great effect, but (what) we saw the other day was the first time we have seen an incident like that in the last seven to 10 years."Malthouse said a send-off rule is "far too harsh", saying the margin for error is too great."I have thought about it," he said. "I don't like it. Every once in a while, we've got to be so cautious of what our actions are. And I feel a red card would be far too harsh. In fact, it is wrong."When it is clear-cut like (Hall's, it would be OK). But there's a lot of times when someone's going to get sent off (wrongly)."We've seen it too often with the red card in soccer. Players sent off, only to be looked at and you go 'The bloke's taken a dive' or 'That's not really there'."The penalty to a team and its members if a player is sent off incorrectly would be too great, according to Malthouse."You've got to remember, there's consequences of all actions. Every action has a reaction and . . . the public, particularly members (who) pay hard-earned cash to be a member, they want to see Collingwood, Essendon, North Melbourne, Carlton . . . have an honest and realistic chance of winning."If we make a mistake with one of those, automatically, we are seeing some members being penalised."But laws of the game committee member and former Richmond player Kevin Bartlett has a different view to Thompson and former premiership teammate Malthouse. Bartlett has long been an advocate of a send-off rule, saying during the week that it should be introduced, but with strict guidelines to limit its use to the most severe cases."I have always been strong that I can see no reason why a send-off rule could not be in the AFL rule book under very strict guidelines," Bartlett said on his morning program on radio station SEN."You don't want an umpire thinking he saw something and sending off a player and video shows it didn't happen - that sort of thing - it would have to be something the umpire was absolutely certain about and something he thought was absolutely disgusting and a disgrace to the rules of Australian football."Hall agrees with Bartlett's views, saying in his Age column that he has been in favour of a send-off rule for a long time, and furthermore, he deserved to be sent off after he knocked out Staker in last weekend's match."I reckon introducing a red card into AFL would be a good idea . . . and yeah, I deserved one on Saturday night," Hall wrote on Friday."There should be a send-off rule for an act such as mine, particularly if the player injured is not coming back on to the field. It is unfair to have the opposition one good player down when you've just whacked him and you are still able to keep running around." -- With ADRIAN LOWE, AAP
© 2008 The Age