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Thread: Staging

  1. #1

    Staging

    I think staging is a blight on the game and should be cracked down on hard. It makes it much harder for umpires to officiate if they have always to be second guessing themselves and it means legitimate frees may not be paid as well as (obviously) potentially resulting in illegitimate frees being paid. If you don't crack down on it, it is an invitation to players to try it on, especially in close contests and at crucial times when it could affect the result of a match.

    Second, and more important, it is a horrible look! We revere these players for their toughness and we despise it when they fake it. We love the fact that AFL is not full of diving prima donnas like in soccer. If we value these traits we have to remove the incentive to do it.

    What's the argument the other way? Why would you protect Rance by claiming his staging was "not excessive"? The only argument I can think of is that when a player is struck (or whatever) they may reasonably wish to highlight the fact to umpires to get a free they are actually entitled to. I think this is a fair point. But I still think it would be better to just tell the players "stay out of it, leave it to the umpires", and warn them that "exaggerating" will be treated as staging as well. Provided (a) there is fair warning of this; and (b) the rule is applied consistently (a big if, I know); then I think this takes any harshness out of a 'no exaggeration' rule. Then, whenever there is any clearly detectable level of exaggeration, you can penalise for staging. Of course there will still be times when it is unclear whether a player has exaggerated and, in that case, they get the benefit of the doubt. But I think if it is clear that they have exaggerated to any degree they should get at least a warning or free kick against or something to stop them doing it.

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