Fair call. Think you mean Harris Andrews. Gareth was a battler.
Fair call. Think you mean Harris Andrews. Gareth was a battler.
Indeed Harris AndrewsOriginally Posted by Blood Fever
free Kicks. Well, I have a take on this. With most umpires coming from Victoria there is going to always be hometown bias. That is a natural phenomenon. People are subconsciously biased. This relates to their upbringing & their football experiences as a kid. Psychological research tells us that learned behaviors & biases from childhood are hard to break and subconsciously they may stay with us for life.
but I don't think bias is the main problem. I think the way the rules have been rewritten is far too interpretive. The rules were very simply written in previous versions but in the last 10-20 years the AFL has been changing rules and writing much more complicated and open rules. for instance the term 'INCOORECT DISPOSAL'. There is not any simple explanation of what exactly that means in the new rules. In the old rules it was simple. If you did not handball, handball was explained or kick the ball, a real kick was explained, you were deemed to have incorrectly disposed. But now with the introduction of PRIOR OPPORTUNITY, this is also in doubt. How long is PRIOR OPPORTUNITY? One second? 5seconds? 5 minutes? This is not explained in the rules either. I could point out 20 other rules that have been changed that are so interpretive. The head high rule is confusing due to new ducking interpretation. The sliding rule is being umpired differently than when first introduced. A push in the back is no longer a push in the back if you are a forward but the slightest touch from a defender gets a shot at goal. Rules applied to only some players are against the spirit of the game. all these rules are interpretive. Players are allowed to throw the ball if they are top mids. Top mids can get away with anything, including ducking, bending legs etc. There are far too many interpretive rules and each umpire interprets them differently. This does not allow for consistency when you have four different interpretations.
My other point is on standard of umpiring. The more umpires you introduce the lower the standard of umpiring. This is simple sense. These guys are part timers. They are not professional umpires, unlike Soccer and most other sports. Umpires are rarely on the same page with different interpretations, standing in the wrong positions to see the play & just not identifying with the player. This is the fault of the AFL. The new no talk back rule and the umpires becoming more dictatorial is murdering the game. Characters are not allowed anymore. It is a wonder Tom Papley is not penalised for his goal celebration. A little bit of lip never hurt anyone. It also builds character in the umpire. The great umpires, before 2000, had personality and it came out when the players gave lip. Now the umpires are just seen as a bunch of dictatorial dickheads. They have no personality & if they do, like Razor Ray, they are penalised. He has never gotten a GF yet some of the worst umpires in the history of the game get GF. All because they have 'Hitler Syndrome'
Agree with you on too much confusion. Chamberlain has umpired 2 GFs but probably should have a couple more on ability.
I agree. The same idiots get GF every year. Then last year they chucked in two newbies, who is the most confusing umpire of all. Why not Ray? because Ray is different & you can't have different. Rasy gets along with the players. You can't have that either. Especially if they are not Victorian players lol. Stevic gets on well with Vic players because they travel on the same plane to matches when interstate. Stay at same hotels. My nephew once said the Vic teams, he is a Hawks supporter, know the Vic umpires really well and they get the advantage of knowing the interpretations that are going to be used in interstate matches because they learn them on the plane. This is atrocious if true. But it wouldn't surprise me.
Ray Chamberlain is not Victorian, he is from the ACT. Prediction: He won't get another AFL GF. Why because he has a personality. The GF umpires have none.
Of the umpires that have umpired all GF since 2000. There have been 13 Victorian, 1 SA, 2 WA, NSW 1 ( he is actually from Albury League, so he could be Victorian), ACT 1. There seems to be a lack of interstate representation here. Mind you there are 22 Victorian umpires, 5 SA, 6 WA, 1 NSW ( he umpired Albury League so he might actually be from Wodonga), 6 Qld (mainly on the supplementary list, only 2 on the main list), ACT 2 (1 on list, 1 sup), Tas 1.
Neutrality is not the Afl's strong suit.The ridiculous situation of the MCG grand final makes the competition a laughing stock in terms of fairness. Neutral umpires for each game makes sense. Happens in test cricket mow after many years so maybe one day in the future it could happen. At the moment, VAFL reigns.
You're not wrong. The rules definitely require a lot of interpretation.
One example is "deliberate out of bounds". That turns umpires into mindreaders. It's nonsense.
Going too far without bouncing the ball (travel). How far is 15 metres exactly when a player is running hither and thither while dodging opponents?
Prior opportunity. How long is "prior"?
The rules should be overhauled to replace opinions with facts.
Deliberate out of bounds? Get rid of that. Introduce some kind of last touch on kicks, handballs, hitouts and tap-ons, but the player receiving the free cannot kick the ball back into play unless the ball was kicked out of bounds or put out in a ruck contest. This needs some tweaking as described. Bound to be controversial, but no more controversial really than requiring the umpires to be psychics.
Travel: count the steps the player takes. After 15 steps without a bounce, blow the whistle.
Prior opportunity: 2 seconds or two steps, whichever occurs first. No opinions, no interpretations, just facts.
"Unbelievable!" -- Nick Davis leaves his mark on the 2005 semi final
This is all very well, but there is no getting away from interpretation in the application of the rules. It's just the nature of the game. Some rules could be tightened up as you suggest, but interpretation will always be a part of our game. Take the push in the back for example. A player is tackled, and the tackler rolls him to one side. At what point does the roll have to commence? Right at the start of the tackle? Half-way through? Just before he hits the ground? There are lots of things in our game that we can't possibly be precise about. Good umpiring is about making reasonable interpretations. The problem is that some umpires are sometimes manifestly unreasonable. The concept of reasonableness is central to our legal system, so there's no reason(!) why it shouldn't be central to the interpretation of the laws of our game.
I think you mistaken - I regard what is being labelled "interpretation" is the single greatest blight on the game.
Umpires taking time to interpret player interactions is what allows time for the game to get clogged up. Your in-the-back scenario is a really good example of entities being multiplied unnecessarily - the umpires should carry both a whistle and Occam’s razor. They should use both with decisiveness.
Interpretation is intrinsic to the game, but vacillation is not – and the two are being confused, worse the latter is being excused because it is being misidentified as the former.
Football is a game, what happens inside the boundary is an artificial construct – it's not reality. It has simple rules that are manifestly there to swiftly penalise unfair behaviour, so completely unlike our legal system.
And those simple rules of the game actually work really well. Unless they are impeded by umpires that are afraid to act decisively, and administrators that tolerate it. The last thing the game needs is for the rules themselves to be further impeded by lawyerly obfuscations.
Last edited by Ruck'n'Roll; 23rd December 2023 at 08:22 AM.
Loose translation from the Latin is - I am tall, so I hit out.
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