His unsuccessful challenge at the AFL tribunal on Tuesday night means he will not only miss Sunday’s clash with Geelong, but be forced to carry 97.88 demerit points with him for the next 12 months.
While the Eagles didn’t get their desired outcome at the tribunal, one felt the club – tired of the physical harassment its star onballer receives – challenged the case as much to make a statement as it did in the hope of beating the charge.
Earlier in the day, Kerr’s coach had leapt to his defence.
“If he's guilty then he knows there's going to be a lot of players in strife for hitting him,” West Coast coach John Worsfold had said on Tuesday.
Kerr’s case was the most intriguing of the three before the AFL tribunal.
The midfielder gave evidence via video link-up from Perth, however his legal team was at Docklands to represent him.
The hearing, which lasted about 40 minutes, started with the tribunal viewing several replays of the incident from various angles.
The Eagles argued that Kerr’s action against Murphy did not constitute a strike.
“We submit that player Kerr has no case to answer because it’s not a strike, it was a clear bump,” Eagles player advocate David Grace, QC, told the tribunal.
“That’s allowed within the rules of the game … there was an identical incident seconds before involving [Bret] Thornton and [Matt] Rosa.”
Replays had shown the centre-square scuffle involving several players before the match, in which the Carlton defender appeared to lash out at Rosa in a similar action to that of Kerr on Murphy.
There was contention as to whether or not the Eagles could refer to a separate incident when defending Kerr, however given Kerr spoke about that incident, the tribunal relented.
“I saw the action between Thornton and Rosa and I just replicated it,” Kerr told the tribunal.
The AFL’s match review panel, after releasing its finding from round 10, did assess the incident involving Thornton and Rosa however the panel said that contact was below the force required to constitute a reportable offence. This evidence was also brought up during the case.
Kerr described his contact with Murphy as “a bump”.
“I must have got him in the bread basket for him to go down the way he did,” Kerr said.
“It’s contact that gets used on me every game and I use every game.”
The AFL’s legal counsel, Jeff Glesson, argued that Kerr knew how to bump properly, citing that the Eagle’s elbow was not tucked into his body when he made contact with the Carlton midfielder.
