North Melbourne have lost their battle in Court and Carlton hopes to avoid the same fate before their clash on Good Friday.
After just under half an hour of deliberations, Kangaroos defenseman Griffin Logue was unable to overturn his one-game ban for rude conduct.
Now Blues winger Blake Acres, also charged with rude conduct in an incident classified as reckless conduct with medium impact and high contact, will try to be more successful.Follow the AFL Tribunal hearings on the live blog at the bottom of the article!
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Logue told the Court that he only became aware of Hawthorn’s Will Day shortly after the ball bounced off his foot.
When asked “did you ever make a conscious decision to initiate body contact?” by North Melbourne solicitor Ben Ihle, Logue said no.
“When it happens that fast, you really don’t know what position the opposing player would be in,” said the Roos recruit.
“Taking off at that rate of more than 90% throttle, I tried to slow down. To attempt a hard stop faster than that would result in some type of biomechanical injury for me.”
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Ihle said that Logue was involved in “a quintessential football act”.
“It’s a textbook approach to a loose ball coming off the baseline.”
Ihle also said that the broadcast view of the incident was misleading, with the camera turning away from Logue and thus giving a “false impression”.
Logue’s action, Ihle said, was “a textbook action and not unreasonable in any material respect.”
The AFL, represented by Nick Pane, said Logue made the decision to strike and braced the right side of his body for contact with Day.
While Logue said that he was unaware of Day until very late in the incident, Pane disputed this, saying that Logue had to have been aware of Day and that he was open and vulnerable.
“We are satisfied that the charge was filed under the rude conduct (high crashes) provision,” the Court concluded.
“Logue entered the contest at high speed, saw a Hawthorn player also enter the contest, and after initially preparing to bend down to pick up the ball, changed his intent and did not attempt to pick up the ball, instead choosing to hit it.
“It is true that the decision to do so was made quickly. We are clearly pleased that he could and should have gone lower and closer to the ball with his hands in an attempt to pick up the ball rather than choose to hit it.
“We found Logue’s way of contesting the ball to be unreasonable and he engaged in brusque conduct as a result.”
Acres’ contact with Giant Brent Daniels in the fourth quarter of Carlton’s win received the same marks as the Logue incident: careless conduct, high contact and medium impact, equaling a one-game suspension.
Carlton contends that Blake Acres’s conduct was not unreasonable under the circumstances.
If the Court is against Carlton on that, Carlton holds that the impact is low or negligible and that the contact is primarily with the body.
The MRO in Round 1 raised the “impact” rating of two incidents: Kysaiah Pickett’s hit on Bailey Smith and Shane McAdam’s hit on Jacob Wehr, as they had the potential to cause injury, despite the fact that neither Smith nor Wehr were dropped from their respective parties. due to a post-coup concussion.
Pickett received a two-week suspension by the MRO, which was not contested by the Demons, while McAdam was sent directly to court, where he received a three-match suspension.
Follow the AFL Court on the live beat below from 4pm AEST!