Eddie McGuire proposes radical umpire revamp in wake of footy world’s anger
Get rid of the bounce, dump goal umpires and dish out a hefty pay rise. Eddie McGuire has unveiled a bold plan that would change the face of AFL umpiring as we know it.
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Footy powerbroker Eddie McGuire has unveiled a radical new plan to overhaul the AFL umpiring system in an effort to solve one of the most divisive issues in the game.
The former Collingwood president has spoken to key shareholders, including players, umpires and administrators about trying to make the on-field officials the “AFL’s 19th team” by streamlining their numbers, making them versatile and guaranteeing them $300,000 per season.
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McGuire’s bold plan, which he revealed on Footy Classified on Wednesday night, would involve:
McGuire’s plan, which he has already taken to the AFL HQ, comes as the league insists there will be zero tolerance on umpire dissent after a number of controversial 50m penalties paid during Round 5.
“This has all come to a head in the last few days as we know, but we need to stop putting Band-Aids on this issue and come up with a better solution,” McGuire told the Herald Sun.
“We need to ask ourselves how we would set up umpiring if we started from scratch today.
“If we are fair dinkum about showing respect, let’s make (the umpires) like the 19th team and make them a bigger part of this competition.
“Let’s pay them accordingly, and then let’s demand the output that someone on $300,000 needs to produce.
“We are talking about showing respect. You don’t demand respect, you command respect.”
McGuire said it was ridiculous the AFL used 99 umpires in nine matches every round – including field, boundary, goal, emergency field and emergency goal umpires – yet only 27 can pay free kicks.
His system would allow any of the eight umpires on the field at the one time (four in general play and four around goals) to make decisions.
The teams could umpire two different games on a weekend, with members rotating their respective roles.
“Let’s get rid of the boundary umpires and get rid of the goal umpires,” he said.
“I would have four umpires on the ground and two goal umpires at either end of the ground who can also pay free kicks.
“I would like to see five teams of nine umpires do the job (every round) as opposed to what we have now as we send out 99 umpires and only 27 of them can pay a free kick.”
He said the players and umpires he had spoken to were all in favour of banning the bounce, with the grid formation required for the field umpires also likely to be less taxing on their bodies.
“We don’t need to make umpires run 16 or 17 or 18 kilometres per game then to make them do a party trick by bouncing the ball,” he said.
McGuire said he would even look at modernising the traditional umpires’ attire to make it more professional and authoritative.
Players clear on ‘arms out’: Pendles
—Sam Landsberger
Clubs are adamant the disconnect between umpire dissent rules only exists for the football public after the AFL sufficiently forewarned clubs how strictly this season would be governed.
The focus has suddenly shifted on the league’s failure to properly communicate the ‘arms out’ rule to its fans as captains and coaches argue this week’s media storm is news to everyone but them.
“As players we are so clear that anything we do will be 50m,” Collingwood captain Scott Pendlebury said on Wednesday.
“We had pre-season games … giving six or seven away. Now we wouldn’t even average one a week.
“I feel like the media is the last group to understand it. The players have all got a handle on it.
“The coaches pretty clearly say we know what to expect, but it’s the media (and) guys commentating games of football that seem to have a big issue with it.
“And then that goes into the public forum and gets spoken about so much.”
Essendon captain Dyson Heppell echoed Pendlebury, sentiments also shared by Western Bulldogs skipper Marcus Bontempelli.
They were all supportive of the initiative given the shortage of grassroots umpires.
“We’ve got to realise it’s bigger than what happens out here (MCG), it’s what happens at the lower levels as well,” Pendlebury said.
Heppell said: “They (umpires) do an amazing job. We need young kids wanting to umpire games and feeling they are respected”.
Carlton assistant coach Aaron Hamill said: “Their (AFL) education and process through it has been very good”.
AFL asking the impossible of players: Riewoldt
—Nick Smart and Chris Cavanagh
Richmond star Jack Riewoldt believes it is not possible for players to show no dissent towards umpires, describing player reactions to umpiring decisions as “body language” and “human nature.”
Amid widespread confusion from players and the public over the rules, AFL football operations boss Brad Scott on Tuesday backed all the free kicks paid for umpire dissent throughout round five.
These included an “arms out” 50m penalty paid against Brisbane’s Harris Andrews last Thursday night and a 50m penalty paid against Hawthorn pair Jack Gunston and Tom Mitchell for pointing to the replay screen on Monday.
When asked on Tuesday night whether it was possible for players to conduct themselves in a manner where zero dissent was shown towards the umpires, Riewoldt said on Fox Footy’s AFL360:
“No, it just happens and it just is what it is.
“I put my hands out like this, that’s body language and a natural reaction … it’s going to be hard to stop because it’s human nature to turn around and be like ‘come on, umpire.’
“It doesn’t matter what I say, they’ve come out and said you can’t put your arms up, so we’ll just march to the beat of that drum.”
Riewoldt said he believed the AFL has cracked down on the rule after being fairly lenient in the early rounds after being red hot on the crackdown during pre-season games.
“I’ve been surprised they haven’t done it a bit earlier, because we got told by the AFL and the umpires they were going to ping people for this pretty early on,” Riewoldt said.
“And it happened a lot in the sort of pre-season competition and then it sort of went away again for a little bit.”
The Tigers spearhead said he didn’t like the new rule but would play by it.
“I think there are bigger issues in terms of umpire dissent, and please don’t get me wrong in terms of saying am I trying to say that you should be able to do whatever you want to the umpires.
“But I don’t think hands out is that big of an issue in the grand scheme of things.
“And I think it’s caused more angst because the public maybe didn’t get the heads up about what’s going to happen towards umpires now because this rule’s popped up and people sort of haven’t had the forewarning it’s going to happen.”
Scott said that umpires had missed a further six “clear” free kicks across the weekend for similar incidents and the league was working hard with officials to provide greater consistency in policing the rule.
“Dissent towards umpires will not be tolerated,” Scott said.
“It’s incumbent upon us at the elite level to set the standards of behaviour for all levels of the game.
“We’ve fallen short as a football community and dissent towards umpires during matches has become an issue at all levels of the game, particularly the community level where we’re still 6000 umpires short of what we need to keep up with the participation in the game.”
Scott said the crackdown on umpire dissent had “strong support from everyone at club land” and players had to adjust.
“In terms of what that level looks like, that’s up for the umpire to decide. But we’ve been really clear on this, really clear to the clubs.
“With the inconsistency on the weekend where we paid some and we didn’t play others, I get that some players might ask what’s the level of dissent that we’re allowed to produce. The answer is none.
“Our umpires missed some and we acknowledge that and we’ll work on that.”
Scott admitted that the league had allowed standards to slip after being strong on the matter during pre-season and across the early rounds.
“We definitely dropped off after Round 3 and as a response to that we sent five very clear examples to the clubs of decisions that we missed,” Scott said.
“We had a really good response from the clubs and they were appreciative of the heads up. So clubs are crystal clear on it.”
The crackdown comes as community football leagues continue to struggle to fill umpiring positions, with competitions still 6000 umpires short nationally.
“You can be surprised at a decision but you can’t show dissent towards an umpire. You can’t question an umpire’s decision. It’s been accepted in the game for far too long,” Scott said.
“We have a massive responsibility to football at all levels.
“Anyone who goes to a community game of football and sees 12, 13, 14, 15 year old boys and girls umpiring and copping abuse on the field from players and supporters alike is not acceptable.
“What happens at elite level flows through to the community level.”
Longmire’s call for ‘common sense’ amid AFL crackdown
John Longmire believes footballers should be able to continue to ask questions of umpires during games as the AFL deals with an outpouring of anger over contentious 50m penalties for dissent.
The Sydney coach said there needed to be a “common sense” approach to maintain a respectful on field relationship between players and officials.
“I think everyone’s still going through that feeling-out phase, as regards to what you can or can’t do,” Longmire said of the AFL’s crackdown on umpire abuse.
“My personal view is there’s a difference between asking an umpire a question and abusive behaviour, and hopefully there’s enough common sense to be able to wade our way through those moments that happened during the course of the game.
“It’s really important that players and umpires still have a relationship during a game – and a respectful relationship both ways – and at different times, if they ask a question, in the right manner, hopefully that doesn’t get penalised.
Longmire also called on a commonsense approach in regards to ruling whether “hand gestures” should be classed as dissent.
“I understand the rules, but I live in that grey area, I guess, as far as hopefully there’s also an area to be allowed for comments in regards to common sense and just making the right call at the time,” he said.
“Hopefully that’s still available in the game of AFL football these days.”
Ex-AFL umpire’s dire warning amid furious backlash
– Sam Landsberger
The AFL’s pre-season claim that football was 6000 umpires short at community level has been described as “grossly underexaggerated” as the debate about respect became even further divided on Monday.
Former Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley said players waving their arms was not disrespectful and awarding a 50m penalty as punishment was “ridiculous”.
“This is a train crash and it’s happening in slow motion,” Buckley said.
But only minutes later former field umpire Darren Goldspink, who umpired six AFL grand finals, came on to Buckley’s radio show with an impassioned plea that umpiring was “bleeding” at local level.
Some umpires are being forced to sweat through five matches per weekend due to the suburban shortage and Goldspink, 57, feared the worst.
“How is that any good for anybody? The guys who are doing five games are old guys like me who aren’t in any physical condition to do five games,” he said on SEN.
“What’ll happen, and this might be over the top, but one of them is going to have some sort of serious medical episode on the ground and then we’ll all stand up and say, ‘Oh shit that shouldn’t have happened’.
“It just riles me.”
Goldspink said the AFL had unintentionally heaped even more pressure on umpires through its plan to stamp out abuse.
In February, the league wrote to senior coaches outlining a sharpened importance for respect towards umpires.
“In isolation what the AFL has tried to do is fair enough and we all know the reasons why they do that,” Goldspink said.
“To me it seems like it’s had the opposite effect at the moment. It’s just putting more pressure on umpires.”
Buckley called for the AFL to handball the game’s most divisive issue over to the umpiring department instead of mandating a rule that appeared too grey to be enforced with consistency.
Harris Andrews (Brisbane Lions) and Tom Mitchell (Hawthorn) paid the ultimate price for sticking their arms out in apparent acts of dissent and were penalised with 50m penalties that gifted certain goals.
Other players across the round got away with similar or perhaps even more demonstrative actions when they waved their arms in disbelief of decisions.
The former Collingwood coach said the penalty was “ridiculous”, sarcastically asking what angle arms had to be at to trigger a 50m infringement.
While round 5 threw up moments of frustration some umpires have been content with some serious improvement from players.
Round 4 saw Jack Riewoldt – who appeared furious at a whistle for a split second – quickly realise such emotion was out of line.
Riewoldt nodded politely and put his hand up as if to apologise in what was a great exchange and sign of leadership from a senior player.
In Round 2 youngster Nick Daicos also spun potential anger into acceptance by quickly handing the ball over and getting on with his second game of AFL footy.
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