The Bachar Houli furore sent the wrong message about one-punch violence and celebrity sway, writes Richard Earle

THE Bachar Houli controversy this week outlined the trouble with celebrity in the AFL, writes Richard Earle.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull with Richmond’s Bachar Houli at an announcement regarding one of Houli’s off-field programs.

THE Bachar Houli precedent had deep, unintended ramifications - endorsing one punch violence at prime ministerial level while leaving the AFL Match Review Panel trampled and discredited by a cult of celebrity.

Identity politics, emanating from Muslim television personality Waleed Aly and extended by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, proved on the nose with AFL fans in the Houli controversy.

Nothing could justify a Houli hit that knocked Carlton’s Jed Lamb senseless ast week against Richmond. The Phillip Hughes tragedy underlined the perils of head injury in sport.

A flaky AFL Match Review Panel signalled the difference between punishment for smashing a fellow professional cold and light penalty is the insidious hand of political correctness.

AFL’s penalty regime prescribed a four-game ban as the starting point for high intentional impact to the head but the tribunal handed Houli a two-game ban.

A character reference from Richmond fan and cultural warrior Aly backed by prime ministerial support led the panel away from its routine rule application and interpretation.

“It is very rare that we come across an example of such a fine character ... and on that basis it’s a two-week penalty,” said tribunal member Wayne Henwood.

Aly argued Houli should receive a lenient suspension due to being the first devout Muslim to play AFL while adding the defender “bears the burden of a community that is desperately short of heroes and role models”.

Follow Aly’s lead and the Adelaide Football Club must deploy popular Christian Guy Sebastian as its celebrity trump in future tribunal hearings.

If committed Christian Hugh Greenwood clobbers a Carlton rival at the MCG today then respected Crows chairman Ron Chapman should have Guy and self-proclaimed “fixer” Chris Pyne on speed dial.

A four-game suspension became two until the AFL staged an historic intervention against a “manifestly inadequate” verdict. AFL boss Gillon McLachlan realised a stance against head contact had been compromised by its own tribunal.

Having doled out $650,000 to Houli’s Foundation that promotes Muslim youth to embrace AFL, supportive lines from the Prime Minister were included to back Houli’s impeccable character. Does the Prime Minister shower bags of cash on youngsters of other faiths or references for those in trouble?

Carlton's Jed Lamb is tended to after being knocked out by Richmond's Bachar Houli last weekend.

Three innocent students were last year left to fret while wrongly pursued by the Human Rights Commission for using an Aboriginal-only computer room at a Queensland university. The PM’s staff fell over themselves to intervene in Houli’s tribunal hearing on Tuesday night.

Here we have a government funding multi-million dollar campaigns against one-punch assaults, then a prime minister implicated in the defence of reprehensible violence on the football field.

Sydney premiership spearhead Barry Hall has admitted on Channel Nine’s The Footy Show that his round four, 2008 head blow to Brent Staker could have been fatal.

“Yeah, absolutely it could have been worse. There’s this one punch thing in society getting around every weekend and it has to stop,” said Hall.

Lamb will sit out today’s clash against Adelaide, affected by severe concussion. Houli is fortunate to miss four games after an AFL appeal against the ruling of its tribunal was upheld. A clean record over 162 games deserved consideration but not off-field character references.

The MRP banished Port Adelaide’s Tom Jonas for six matches after knocking out West Coast’s Andrew Gaff in May last year but going soft on Houli sent a divisive message.