Rosewater Football Club player sends SAAFL nasty message on Facebook after team was dumped from league

ROSEWATER Football Club is in hot water again after a photo posted to social media contained offensive language towards the SAAFL, three days after the club was booted from the grassroots comp.

Rosewater veteran Adam Rumbelow has been banned from the game for 20 years after an attack on an ump last week. His club has also been dumped from the SAAFL for the rest of the season.

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ROSEWATER Football Club is in hot water again after a group photo was posted to social media, saying “f*** you” to the SA Amateur Football League.

The SAAFL has asked the club to explain the photo, which appeared on Facebook on Saturday — three days after the club was booted from the state’s largest grassroots competition.

The photo — which shows players doing a rude hand gesture, while the caption reads: “f*** u saafl” — was posted by a senior player.

SAAFL chief executive John Kernahan said the “latest furore” validated the league’s concerns about the club.

“Fortunately what it does do is validate our ongoing concerns that there were factions within the Rosewater Football Club who could not, or would not, accept any accountability for their conduct,” he said.

He said the club was going to be subject to ongoing affiliation requirements next year and the Board of Management hadn’t had the opportunity to “discuss what may come of this latest furore — if any at all”.

“But I would imagine any consideration for lesser sanctions have certainly been diluted,” he said. “That said, a picture speaks a thousand words so could there be any bigger penalty than what will come from the court of public opinion.

“The really sad part will be that some of these people will move on and leave a skeleton of a football club to some well-meaning and hardworking people to try and recover from.”

The Rosewater Football Club has been contacted for comment.

On Wednesday night, the club’s 300-game veteran and longtime captain, Adam Rumbelow, pleaded guilty at a tribunal hearing to attacking central umpire Craig Trewartha.

The 20-year ban on Rumbelow, 36, is believed to be a record.

A Rosewater Football Club senior player has posted this image to Facebook with the caption: “f*** u saafl” three days after the club was deregistered by the SA Amateur Football League. Picture: Facebook

The umpire was left with a cut and badly bruised eye.

The incident occurred during the match against Blackfriars Old Scholars on Saturday July 16, prompting a special meeting on Tuesday of the Board of Management, which deregistered the 130-year-old club.

But the club has vowed to return to the SAAFL next year and its president has personally apologised to the umpires’ panel over Rumbelow’s attack.

The league has dumped the club — whose No. 1 ticket holder is local MP and Premier Jay Weatherill — for the remainder of 2016 after a series of incidents and abuse directed at umpires.

Rosewater president Ron Chapman visited the league umpires’ panel before training on Wednesday night to apologise for past violence and threats by Bulldogs players or members.

Rosewater’s A-grade team was fifth on the ladder and in line to play Division Five finals.

Last week, Mr Kernahan said it was not in the league’s nor Rosewater FC’s best interests to reveal the full list of Code of Conduct breaches that led to deregistration but he listed the following:

June, 13, 2015 — player Scott Balchin reported and subsequently suspended for four matches for abusive and threatening language to an umpire.

August 22, 2015 — Brett McPherson reported and suspended for 12 matches for striking, resulting in a broken jaw to an opposition player.

June 15, 2016 — reports of “conduct unbecoming “at an under-18s match, which resulted in a melee and $250 fine.

June 18, 2016 — Jonothan Mahney reported and suspended for eight matches for abusive and threatening language towards an umpire.

July 16, 2016 — Dylan Lockwood reported for undue rough play in the same match an umpire was assaulted. Lockwood refused to leave the ground and the umpire resorted to appealing to Rosewater’s coach for the player to be removed.

July 16, 2016 — Adam Rumbelow reported for abusive language to an umpire, charging an umpire and striking an umpire.

The Bulldogs formed in the mid-1880s and joined the SAAFL in 1949.

They developed a host of stars as juniors including Port Adelaide Magpies’ Bruce Abernethy, who played AFL with North Melbourne, Collingwood and Adelaide, brothers Che (Essendon, Power), David and Donald Cockatoo-Collins (both Melbourne), Jarrad Poulton (Power), Trent Ormond-Allen (Melbourne, Adelaide) and Brian Cunningham, the Power’s first CEO.