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Unfortunately Stevedore, above and beyond everything else, you're on the money because that is the problem. AFL has an enormous grey area and it’s a grey area which, to Dodd's detriment, changes shades of grey from one decision to the next within the same game. It never will get to black and white. Having said that, 30,000 people saw and knew Gilbee imitated a soccer player so how could the umpires not see it, or see it but not know Gilbee was milking? And if you asked 30,000 neutral fans who were watching the game they would no doubt say the same thing, as I am sure you would also.
For a game of even more contact but probably less rulings the rugby league umpires should be the model which the AFL replicates. They handle the situations beautifully and maybe it’s the send off rule which allows it to happen, I don’t know. But if you listen to them when an incident happens, like the one with Dodd and Gilbee, the umpire points and says, “You and you, come here.” He tells everyone else to get away. He then proceeds to say something along the lines of, “You (Dodd) take your possession and stop being a clown and you (Gilbee), you hit him first so stop your acting and get on with it.”
For some reason the players listen, comply and get on with the game. Common sense prevails and no team or individual is penalized on something so trivial. Now if Rugby league umpires have a feel for the game then why can’t the AFL umps have the same and why do we have incidents like we have in AFL on a regular basis?
Mark Harvey would obviously know exactly what happened and, more likely than not, felt for Dodd. However, he probably had a word to him after the game and I believe he did the right thing in not dragging and humiliating him. Rightly or wrongly you'll never change my belief that fans calling Dodd selfish, stupid and an idiot is fair. It's uneducated, very poor form and disappointing.
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