AFL 2022: All the latest injury and MRO news ahead of Round 8

The front-on bump that has divided the AFL community has been ruled upon by the AFL tribunal after Carlton challenged Lewis Young’s body bump on Roo Cam Zurhaar.

Carlton defender Lewis Young has had his one-match suspension for a body bump on North Melbourne’s Cameron Zurhaar overturned.

On Tuesday night, the AFL tribunal threw out Young’s forceful front-on contact report because it deemed that Zurhaar’s head was not down over the ball at the point of contact or immediately beforehand.

The 29-game defender will be available to face Adelaide at Marvel Stadium on Sunday.

Stream every match of every round of the 2022 Toyota AFL Premiership Season Live & Ad-Break Free In-Play on Kayo. New to Kayo? Try 14-Days Free Now >

Lewis Young of the Blues and Hugh Greenwood after the incident

AFL counsel Andrew Woods argued that even though Young did not make contact with Zurhaar’s head, the Blue had the potential to cause injury to it because the Kangaroo was down, looking towards the ball.

After deliberating for about 15 minutes, the jury disagreed.

Jury chairman Jeff Gleeson QC said for that forceful contact charge to be sustained, Zurhaar’s head needed to not only be over the ball, but down above it.

“The reason for that language in the reportable offence is obvious - a player who suffers forceful front-on contact when their head is down is at risk of a head or spinal injury,” Gleeson said.

That meant the jury did not have to consider whether Young’s action was reasonable in the circumstances or judge the level of impact.

Tuesday night’s hearing was the latest test case for the bump and the type of contact penalised in the modern game.

The league has made rule changes in recent years to discourage head-high bumps and protect players who had their heads over the ball from the potential of suffering serious injuries.

Carlton’s counsel, Peter O’Farrell, said you could see the entirety of Zurhaar’s face at the point of impact, which meant his head was never down or over the ball.

O’Farrell also said what Young did showed the league’s rule changes were working.

Young had quite the eventful game against the Kangaroos.

GPS data indicated Young’s speed decelerated from 21.6km/h to 5km/h at the point of contact and O’Farrell used that information to challenge the high impact classification.

“Players are changing their conduct and this incident is a clear demonstration of it,” O’Farrell said.

“Players understand that the high bump is dead.”

O’Farrell said Young took the only option available to him, bumping shoulder to shoulder.

He said the former Western Bulldog could not tackle because Zurhaar did not have the ball, could not run head-first, open up his body or slide in below the knees due to the risks associated and he could not let the Kangaroo pass him to get goalside.

“(Young’s) only option was to brace for the raging bull and that’s what he did,” he said.

In his evidence, Young said when the ball was bobbling, he made a split-second decision to bump and tried to slow down, getting as low as he could while tucking his arm in, to protect Zurhaar’s head.

Woods argued that Young was not contesting the footy, did not know where Zurhaar’s head might be when the contact occurred and could have avoided the collision altogether.

Earlier, former Collingwood star and coach Nathan Buckley had questioned what contact could be allowed in the game if the suspension was upheld.

“It is a skit, it’s Benny Hill type stuff,” Buckley said on SEN.

“And we don’t want to get to that, you need to be able to go and contest the ball.”

Bucks’ take on Young charge

Former Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley says the AFL risks “Benny Hill type stuff” if Lewis Young’s forceful contact suspension is upheld.

Carlton is appealing Young’s suspension, in the latest tribunal case set to put the bump on trial.

Young’s decision to continue his forward movement into North Melbourne’s Cam Zurhaar, despite him bending over to win the ball, was assessed as high contact to the body by the match review panel and he was offered a one-game ban.

His failure to hit Young in the head saw an outcry from former players.

“It is a skit, it’s Benny Hill type stuff,” Buckley said on SEN.

“And we don’t want to get to that, you need to be able to go and contest the ball.”

Buckley said it could determine what level of contact is allowed in the game.

“Looking at it my instant reaction is if you take that out of the game then what contact is allowed.

“When you look at the actual contact it is level with the head but it is across from the head.

“So you go OK that physical action and the level of contact has been executed very well.

“But on the flip side if Zurhaar puts his head down and it is a couple inches to the right then that is the action we are trying to legislate out of the game.

“I’m glad that the club is challenging this because the conversations will take place and they will work out what do we want in the game going forward.

“I’m probably more 50/50 now than I was yesterday, based on the worst scenario but at the same time I just don’t know what players are expected to do other than not compete.”

Buckley said if Young’s suspension was upheld it could change the mindset for players going into contests.

“You think what are we doing with contact in the game, just let players play,” he said.

“How else is he supposed to approach that contest, is he supposed to just sit back and wait for the player to pick up the ball and then tackle him.

“And maybe that is the answer but then you are saying that when you get to 49-51 scenario you actually have to not compete in those next three or so metres and in those milliseconds.

“You’ve got to wait for the next opportunity to contest, and the ball is not round it can bounce back as we saw in the Mitch Robinson case.

“And this may be over the top but we could get to a point where we have four or five blokes just standing around just waiting for it to stop and then someone picks the ball up and gets tackled.

KEY ROO BANNED IN FURTHER BLOW FOR BATTLERS

North Melbourne’s forward line has been left without its only recognisable target against Fremantle after Nick Larkey was suspended for tunnelling Carlton’s Lewis Young.

On a bizarre night Young was also suspended for a front-on hit against North Melbourne’s Cam Zurhaar and will miss against Adelaide next week.

Carlton will also be without Liam Stocker, who injured himself bumping North Melbourne’s Tarryn Thomas but was penalised for the accidental head clash under the summer crackdown.

The trio of suspensions from the Saturday night clash could still have a postscript at the tribunal given Larkey’s incident was assessed as high impact.

Larkey took out Young’s legs after the whistle had blown, with the act assessed as rough conduct.

North Melbourne could argue the low contact, high impact and intentional act was not forceful but the capacity to cause serious injury saw it assessed more harshly.

Hawthorn great Jordan Lewis told Fox Footy on Sunday Larkey was lucky to get away with only one week.

“The whistle had gone and he made a deliberate act to tunnel,” he said.

“The ability to cause serious injury from something so stupid like that is massive. The whistle has gone, he has stopped but he still decides to tunnel Young. I think one week is lucky. It is just stupidity.”

Larkey has been in sparkling form with 17 goals this year as the Roos take on white-hot Fremantle on Friday night at Perth Stadium.

No other Roos player is in double figures with Larkey trailed by Jack Ziebell (seven), Zurhaar (six), Todd Goldstein (five), Jack Mahony (four) and Jy Simpkin (four).

Zurhaar was collected heavily by Young in a later incident and while there was glancing contact to his head most of the impact was made to his shoulder.

This better be punished. Dog act pic.twitter.com/xpbT6tVi7M

— Carlton Blues Fans (@CarltonFCBlues) April 30, 2022

DN on the free kick paid against Nick Larkey for tunneling: Discipline is something we have to address internally, again.

— North Melbourne FC (@NMFCOfficial) April 30, 2022

Nick Larkey collides with Jacob Weitering.

Larkey had his shirt ripped off in a melee.

Young did not show a duty of care to Zurhaar with the incident assessed as careless given it was in play but of high force.

The Blues take on Adelaide in the Sunday twilight clash next week with Young having stepped up due to the absence of injured defenders Mitch McGovern and Oscar McDonald.

Carlton’s Stocker chose not to tackle North Melbourne midfielder Thomas as he bumped him in an act that also saw an accidental head clash.

Under a summer crackdown that means players bumping are almost always responsible for the contact, he was suspended because Thomas stayed down for some time.

Nick Larkey has his shirt ripped off in a melee after the tunnelling incident.

CAT SUPERSTAR SETS LIKELY RETURN DATE

Josh Barnes

Geelong superstar Patrick Dangerfield has says he “should be right to go” to face GWS Giants next Saturday in Canberra.

The explosive midfielder trained on Saturday morning after missing round 6’s win over North Melbourne and was again left out of a clash with Fremantle a week later as he battles a corked calf.

He had previously played through a corked quad this season and was sore his calf was sore heading into the Easter Monday blockbuster with Hawthorn, only for it to be aggravated early in the match.

He was conspicuously quiet in a role up forward in the second half of that game against the Hawks as his Cats were overrun late.

Stream every match of every round of the 2022 Toyota AFL Premiership Season Live & Ad-Break Free In-Play on Kayo. New to Kayo? Try 14-Days Free Now >

Patrick Dangerfield says he will return from injury next week. Picture: Getty Images

Cats coach Chris Scott said this week that a lack of training time had held back the Brownlow medallist from selection to face the Dockers and a conservative call was made to give him another week off.

Dangerfield said on Saturday he just needed check off “a few boxes” early next week before he was declared fit to face the Giants.

“Had a very solid hitout (on Saturday morning) – not very solid – but it was solid enough,” he told the Geelong president’s function.

“Should be right to go next week, a few boxed to tick Monday and main training next week but all things going well, should be right to do.

“It was just a bit more of a conservative route this week.”

Dangerfield said the Cats would be wary of the Giants in Canberra next week, as he said they had played competitive footy in the first quarter of the season despite poor results.

“There are still some really good sides outside the eight, you could argue that GWS, who have only won one game are no pushovers,” he said.

“They have played some really good footy.”