THAT Nick Watson copped an AFL sanction for cheekily flipping the bird at the MCG on Sunday while Willie Rioli escaped one for threatening a rival player via social media is difficult to comprehend.
Lining up Paul Curtis' three-match ban for a football act on a football field with the Rioli non-action is even more confusing.
Even when a match-long physical and verbal focus on Rioli by Western Bulldogs players during Saturday's round eight match in Ballarat is taken into account, it doesn't compute. Apparently, the targeting of Rioli was organic in its unfolding, and at times aggressive. It may have been, in the eyes of some, against the spirit of the game, whatever that means these days. But it didn't breach any rules.
That Bailey Dale accepted Rioli's apology somehow meant it disappeared off the AFL radar. "The AFL has today spoken to both Port Adelaide and the Western Bulldogs and while confirming it will take no further action to that undertaken by the clubs and players, it has reminded both clubs to ensure any communications remain respectful," it said in a statement on Monday night.
Move on, nothing to see here, despite the threat to Dale suggesting he be careful should he choose to leave his accommodation in Darwin this weekend, where he and the Bulldogs are to play Gold Coast in round nine. That Dale wanted this matter out of the public spotlight should not have been part of the AFL's deliberations.
I accept and respect the AFL decisions made on Watson and Curtis, and other recent sanctions handed down by the AFL, and I realise the considerations of them carried a deterrent component in their outcomes. But the discretion applied to the Rioli case didn't seem to be applied there.
Before Watson was fined, Harley Reid and Bailey Smith also copped financial penalties for flipping the bird to spectators.
Rioli's coach Ken Hinkley somehow got fined $20,000 for saying to Hawk Jack Ginnivan, "you won't be flying to Sydney, Jack" after last year's semi-final at Adelaide Oval.
Extraordinarily, that was the same financial sanction slapped on North Melbourne coach Alastair Clarkson in last year's pre-season, when he directed an embarrassing array of words, including a homophobic slur, to St Kilda players during a practice match.
In another case which left the AFL open to judgments of hypocrisy, Richmond's Noah Balta was cleared to play despite pleading guilty to assault and before he was sentenced by a NSW court.
With what some are viewing as an inconsistent approach on discipline, the AFL is risking losing the faith of those who coach, play and administer the game at club level.
Already this year, we have seen a return to the 1980s and 1990s where coaches have been prepared to defiantly speak out against perceived problems. Those coaches, including Chris Scott, Luke Beveridge, Ross Lyon, Damien Hardwick and Brad Scott, have clearly tired of failing to be heard the way they want to be heard.
And they are growing increasingly enraged that the financial caps under which they and their football departments operate under have not returned to anything like pre-COVID levels, just as every other facet of operations has.
The Curtis case, which last week was flushed through the Match Review Office and Tribunal system, proved the AFL's own rules weren't equipped to deal with nuances in the way the game is actually played on weekends. AFL chief executive Andrew Dillon had flagged pre-season that the judiciary system would be reviewed, so that is at least one facet of operations which will be improved before 2026.
But as it stands, Curtis is missing one less game for delivering a tackle than Conor Nash is for knocking out Gryan Miers with a punch.
There are other contentious and major issues which need resolution, too:
- The AFL and its players are poles apart on reaching agreement on a new Illicit Drugs Policy;
- The national draft is so heavily compromised with father-son and Academy player selections that it has lost nearly all the randomness of selection;
- The standard of umpiring is an annual debate, and in 2025 that debate is as loud as it has ever been;
- Opening Round is in desperate need of a proper debrief after its first two seasons. It may tick the boxes of some national growth metrics, but it ostracises bolted-on supporters and creates an unnecessary need for early-round byes.
And now, Collingwood is choosing to leave out massive names in Scott Pendlebury, Jordan De Goey, Brody Mihocek and Brayden Maynard from its team to play Fremantle on Thursday. I have no problem with this, but the AFL was so incensed with Fremantle and North Melbourne resting a combined 20 players in the final round of 2015 that it introduced a post-final round bye the following year.
In my eyes, that is yet another problem that headquarters needs to resolve. That bye needs to go after 2025, for it has lessened the premiership chances of teams which have finished in the top four. The bye, if it must stay, should be moved to post-preliminary finals, if not for any other reason than to allow a player time to work through concussion protocols in the event of a head knock in a preliminary final.
There is a lot of work for the AFL to do, the fallout to the Rioli decision now front and centre.
Maybe, as part of negotiations on Monday, it was determined privately that Rioli will be spending time away from the game. His actions this year on and off-field suggest he could benefit from a break.
But if indeed that does happen, the decision should not have been left to the player and club. The AFL was obliged to ban him for the threat he made on the weekend.
