It seems natural to crack down on punching after the Gaff incident, but have we thought it through?
IF the fallout of the Andrew Gaff hit is a crackdown on all levels of punching, will it actually work in favour of the taggers and scraggers, rather than against them?
SPORT thrives on drama. The reality is that while the Josh Jenkins’ Showdown goal and the Andrew Gaff punch were instant negatives, both started wildfire debates that wiped every other story off the front and back pages for a week.
Football was the only thing that mattered to every news editor and news consumer.
The offshoot stories from the Gaff punch were so big they became headlines of their own. The frenzied calls for rule changes. The speculation over the length of the penalty. The handling of the drama by the two clubs involved. The horrific injuries to Andrew Brayshaw. The vastly varied reactions of the Brayshaw family. And the media treatment of Gaff.
And surprisingly lost amid the apologies and character references at Gaff’s tribunal hearing was the victim-blaming reality that Gaff admitted intentionally throwing his punch because he thought he was being unfairly tagged.
“I’d been bumped repeatedly,” Gaff explained, adding that Brayshaw was “blocking me and not letting me run”.
“I’m getting checked off the ball and trying to play the ball and trying to run...I meant to hit him in the chest just to get some space.”
Football has evolved to the point that the punch to the chest, ribs or kidneys, has become the automatic defence for many ball players against taggers and grappling defenders.
Like it or not, as the violence level of the game has dropped, the body punch and the elbow to the ribs has become a major part of the natural on-field order of things.
Gaff has been a fair footballer all career long. This week he called himself “a caring, gentle and measured person”. And yet in his fair footballing mind, his acceptable instinct was to throw a punch to Brayshaw’s body hard enough to inconvenience him for a few breaths or a few minutes. And at worse, give away a free kick or cop a fine.
The obvious option for the AFL is to suspend all players who throw punches. It makes sense that punching be eradicated from a ball game. But the not-so-obvious consequence will be that it will help taggers and defenders who grab, and could put frustrated superstar ball players in the grandstand.
Lance Franklin punched Alex Rance to the throat this year in response to Rance elbowing him in a pack. Neither were suspended. The AFL deemed it part of the strength battle.
Dustin Martin hit Lion tagger Nick Robertson to the head last season and escaped suspension before winning the Brownlow.
If the AFL bans the punch, it must also restore the balance and help ball players by introducing a free kick for every jumper grab and cheap elbow to the ribs off the ball.
But the AFL won’t do that because the fall-out will be fans and commentators screaming that the game has gone soft.
Crow Eddie Betts backed the retention of the sniper punch to the chest and kidneys this week saying, “that’s part of footy…as long as you don’t hit them in the head”.
Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley also refused to put his signature on the “ban the body punch” petition. Because Buckley understands the trickle-down effect.
What the AFL must seriously consider in the wake of the Gaff punch, is not simply what level of contact and violence it wants allowable, but how much the balance of power has now swung against the pure ball player, to the advantage of the tackler, tagger and defensive spoiler. Because it’s all linked.
Should a punch to the chest, throat, or stomach which causes no major damage, continue to be an acceptable part of the physical nature and competitive balance of football, and only result in a free kick or a fine — ss it has always been?
Or has our game evolved past allowing sniper punches to be thrown with no suspension unless the victim is carried off on a stretcher?
And is it fair that you can throw a punch that breaks a jaw and puts four teeth halfway down someone’s throat, and not be sent off?