In trying to minimise concussion, the AFL has tied itself into knots and the players are tripping over them. There is an urgent need for a fresh look.
Here’s one decision the AFL can make that no-one could dissent. At season’s end, it should hold a kind of constitutional convention to overhaul every aspect of the laws of the game and the judicial system that is meant to reinforce them.
“Short of a complete overhaul, there needs to be a solid review at the end of the season to determine what we want the game to look like.”It began with an intention to insulate the game against concussion. It was laudable and – given the legal implications – financially prudent, but also utopian. The game can be and has been made safer, but it cannot be made foolproof.
Speaking on Perth radio on Wednesday, Fremantle star Caleb Serong said he understood the stricture on blatant sling tackles, for instance, but as a smaller player wondered what he was supposed to do. One slip and both players miss at least the next match, one concussed, the other suspended.“If it’s going to get to a point where we can’t take anyone to the ground, it’s going to be hard,” Serong said. “I feel for these guys where they’re trying to lay a tackle - and it ends up in a three-week ban.
Once, this was the business of a rules committee, long since disbanded. Now reinterpretations come down to the field like tablets, not to be confused with prohibited substances. “There is pandemonium in the game at the moment,” said King. “The rules have never been greyer right now. Players are living in this grey area.”
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