"You get the feeling that like Monty Python's Black Knight, the Swans would regard amputation as merely a flesh wound."
I've watched this incident a few times on the match highlights - it comes right at the start of Q4 - and I think Jones was dudded. He is running forward with the flight of the ball, marks it, then takes two short pulling-up steps which are obviously (to me, anyway) not playing-on steps but a way to avoid any possible injury from pulling up abruptly. He then puts his hand out as if to say, "Let's be clear I'm not playing on" and steps back to his mark and in doing so gets jumped. I can understand that people were ropable.
He reminds him of the guys, close-set, slow, and never rattled, who were play-makers on the team. (John Updike, seeing Josh Kennedy in a crystal ball)
I have to agree (unfortunately). If you watch the video for the spot where he originally lands, so where his mark is, he goes back to that after his initial pulling-up steps and the umpire in front of him blows the whistle for the mark. Jones then takes two steps off the mark to play on and is tackled. It must have been the umpire behind him who made the 'play-on' call (you can see Jones looking backwards remonstrating with that umpire). But it is not clear (from the highlights video) if the umpire's 'play-on' call was made BEFORE the tackle.
Hmm. OK, I see what you are saying, goods78 and Meg, including the comments you both make about the umpire's call. On reflection I think what surprised me is that what Jones did you can see a dozen times a game without a whistle intervening. In any case I hope Jones learns from it; better to find out now than in a GF!
He reminds him of the guys, close-set, slow, and never rattled, who were play-makers on the team. (John Updike, seeing Josh Kennedy in a crystal ball)
This is how I saw it. After a putrid first quarter, it was actually a pretty fair effort and quite an enjoyable game (to the extent that losing to the Pies by a point can be enjoyable). The umpiring was fine (though there were a few decisions at key moments that seemed to hurt us), it was a million times better than last week. What I don't understand about the umpiring was that the AFL assured us that all of last week's decisions were correct, but we could have been watching a different sport on Friday night. No wonder fans get cranky.
Horse clearly chose to go in with an extremely young team so I assume he was all right with the result - let's hope that the return of some of the stars has the desired consequence.
Suns leading Hawthorn by 26 points at half time. By the end of this round we could be jostling with Hawthorn (and North) for bottom of the ladder. Even I can see some perverse humour in that.
Anyway, go Gold Coast!
Part of me likes the fact that the competition is even. No games by any club can be taken for granted. The Swans and Hawks won't win the wooden spoon but it could be a 8-10 win only season for the Swans or Hawks. There are too many good midrange teams like Port, Melbourne and Essendon and some solid lower ranked teams like Carlton, The Suns and Freemantle who will win some games.
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