Outrage over Bachar Houli suspension verdict; Will Schofield escapes punishment

FOOTY history has been made with the AFL taking unprecedented action over one star’s “ridiculous” and “pathetic” punishment.

Bachar Houli’s case is heading back to the tribunal.

FOR the first time in the sport’s history, the AFL will challenge the ruling of an AFL judiciary tribunal in a dramatic response to the furore surrounding Richmond star Bachar Houli’s punishment.

It comes as Collingwood president Eddie McGuire slammed the AFL tribunal for taking into account Houli’s character references from Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and media personality Waleed Aly when suspending the Tigers utility for two weeks following a sickening hit on Carlton’s Jed Lamb on the weekend.

The AFL responded to the two-week ban by declaring the punishment is “manifestly inadequate” and will be seeking to slap Houli with further sanctions.

AFL general manager of football operations Simon Lethlean said the game has informed the Tigers and the AFL’s appeals board the league will be challenging Houli’s hit in a special sitting of the AFL appeals board.

The appeal will be heard by three members of the Appeals Board, which consists of Peter O’Callaghan (chairman), Brian Collis QC (deputy chairman), Brian Bourke, Michael Green, Stephen Jurica and John Schultz.

It comes after Houli was found guilty of striking Lamb, but handed down a suspension of just two AFL matches based on the evidence provided by Aly and Turnbull.

The AFL ‘s response has been swift and aggressive.

Lethlean has since claimed the AFL’s response is not a knee-jerk reaction to the high-profile nature of the case and declared the game’s first priority in appealing the suspension is protecting players from future head injuries.

Lethlean reading prepared statement. @AFL #Houli pic.twitter.com/Fuuqd5LBTo

— Matt Thompson (@MattThompson) June 28, 2017

Richmond has also responded to the AFL’s shock move by announcing the club will assess its options before the appeals hearing.

“The club acknowledges the AFL is appealing the Bachar Houli decision and we are currently considering our options,” the club said in a prepared media statement.

There has been widespread outrage over the two-match suspension.

Houli was sent directly to the tribunal, but while most expected him to be slapped with at least a four-week ban, the panel decided two weeks was sufficient.

McGuire said it’s “ridiculous” character references should be taken into account in an instance like this.

“This is ridiculous by the tribunal to take this into account,” McGuire said on Triple M’s Hot Breakfast. “I don’t mind that this was an underlining that Bachar Houli is a really good character.

“The only thing that comes to me in this is, ‘What is his record as a player?’ and it’s unblemished so therefore I believe he should get a discount. Whether that’s six (weeks down) to four or five (down) to three or as it’s turned out maybe four to two.

“My point is this — it should not be taken into account what happens in daily life. It underlines again that he is a good character but that should not have been brought into the determination of his penalty.

“Now that we are starting to look at what people do in their private lives in giving a suspension for what happens on the ground is totally ridiculous and out of control.

“This is a precedent.

“You can be Mother Teresa but if you knock somebody out on the ground you get four weeks. Simple as that.”

Bachar Houli was sent straight to the tribunal for his hefty blow on Jed Lamb.

Fans jumped off their seats in disgust as Houli sent Lamb to the deck with a chilling blow in their round 14 clash, the 29-year-old appeared to intentionally elbow the Blues star while being tagged, forcing the young gun to instantly fall to the ground. Medical staff rushed to tend to the motionless 24-year-old before he was ruled out of the game with concussion.

“I’ve never hit anyone in my life. Never at all,” Houli told Fox Sports after the game. “Obviously it’s something that’s out of my nature. It was purely unintentional.

“I was trying to knock his arm away so I could get a run to the ball. Something that happens nearly every week as a running half-back.”

The Richmond star admitted he was “absolutely shocked” at the situation as he was sent directly to the AFL tribunal.

Houli cited character references from Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and media personality Waleed Aly, which appeared to help him escape a severe penalty.

The Tigers defender pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of careless conduct with high impact to the head but the jury took five minutes to find him guilty of the more severe charge. He was given a two-match suspension.

The decision was blasted by a number of big footy names calling out the decision as “pathetic”. Former Hawthorn star Campbell Brown was up in arms at the lenient suspension, attacking the tribunal in a rant on SEN Evenings.

“Richmond should be doing cartwheels out of the tribunal,” he said.

“No one knows more about the tribunal, MRP and incidents than I do. I think the footy world will be gobsmacked.”

The 33-year-old referenced North Melbourne star Ben Cunnington’s one week suspension for a slap as an example of the tribunal getting their sums wrong.

“You saw Ben Cunnington get a week for slapping someone in the neck. To turn around and throw a back handed elbow that knocks someone out cold, and to only get an extra week, is unbelievably soft and quite pathetic,” he said.

This was the chilling moment Jed Lamb was face-down and motionless on Sunday.

Brown also had a dig at the 29-year-old’s star-studded character references, claiming the incident’s severity should speak for itself.

“I don’t care who the character references are. We all understand he is an outstanding citizen and has been a fair player,” he said.

“But the incident speaks for itself. I thought three-to-four weeks was appropriate. To get two weeks is quite staggering.

“The AFL goes along and pretends to talk about image for the game and they’ll slap blokes hard when they need to. I think this is a case of preferential treatment. I’m not having a go at Houli, but gee whiz, they’ll be a lot of shocked people out there and rightfully so.”

Fans agreed with Brown’s stance, slamming the tribunal for their light-handed approach to the blow.

Two weeks for Houli. Pathetic. It should not matter that he is such a "good character", that action deserved a longer holiday. #AFL

— Alex Fair (@AJFair85) June 27, 2017

I'm sorry. But the fact Houli got 2 weeks is a genuine disgrace.

Good bloke - sure. But he smacked him#MRP

— Tom Chadwick (@TomChadwickFox) June 27, 2017

Pathetic

This makes "intentional" call by tribunal irrelevant

Had Houli been "careless" by MRP, he would've received 2wks with guilty plea https://t.co/tfEngjyRIP

— Shane McInnes (@shanemcinnes) June 27, 2017

So Houli gets two weeks for clobbering and knocking out Lamb. Hard to see Schofield getting same penalty for his "almost windy" on Oliver.

— TimGossage 🤓 (@TimGossage) June 27, 2017

AFL must appeal the tribunal's finding on Houli. Absolutely pathetic effort. We all know Bachar's a nice bloke but it does not matter!

— Nathan Templeton (@nathantemp7) June 27, 2017

Aly — who hosts Channel 10 news and current affairs program The Project — is unsure how the tribunal used his character reference, but says Houli’s upstanding character is well known by many.

“His character precedes him,” Aly told SEN Breakfast on Wednesday morning. “Everyone remarked on this being the last person you’d expect to see in the tribunal. Everyone was talking about what a ripping guy he is and what a remarkable contribution he makes to the clubs he plays for and the community he works in.

“I don’t think he was intending to punch anyone in the head and knock them out, because I know ‘Bash’ personally and I’ve spoken to him as well, I know he was devastated about that thought.

“I think that shows up in his actions as well, the fact he didn’t celebrate after the game, he just went to the Blues directly and sought Jed Lamb out to see how he was.

“It was the kind of thing that ‘Bash’ felt sick about, the fact that it happened and the effect that it had on Jed Lamb obviously, I have very little doubt that he would have had zero intention to hurt him in any way he was just trying to play the game.”

Waleed Aly spoke glowingly of Houli’s character.

AFL match review panel member Nathan Burke was another who disagreed with the decision to take character references into account. “I would probably much prefer if you just looked purely at the incident and graded it on that,” Burke told Fox Sports News.

“If you start bringing in, ‘This bloke’s a good bloke, this bloke’s not a good bloke,’ who are we to actually judge who is a good bloke and who isn’t in the first place?

“And then what we end up with are disparate sentences. If somebody goes in next week and does exactly the same thing but doesn’t know Waleed Aly, doesn’t know the prime minister, does that mean they get three or four weeks?”

Former tribunal member Daniel Harford says Houli’s ban is “absolutely, manifestly inadequate” and rubbing him out for six weeks could be considered a fair punishment.

He expects the AFL to appeal the sentence.

“You cannot have a situation with a player willingly, which was deemed by the tribunal, hitting someone ... with force enough to knock someone out cold, to serve a two-week suspension,” Harford said on RSN radio on Wednesday.

“I don’t care how good a bloke is Monday to Friday.

“It’s no relevance to what he does on the field.”

Houli was on the back foot in front of the tribunal, claiming he felt “really bad” about the incident before saying he immediately apologised to Lamb after the match.

“I felt really bad, obviously, seeing him on the floor. I was shocked to be quite honest. And I felt really bad. Right away,” Houli said.

“Post-game without celebrating ... I went straight to Marc Murphy and Bryce Gibbs and said ‘guys you know the person I am — I would never in my life do anything to hurt anyone’.

“They said ‘we know who you are — it’s all good’.”

“After the game, I was leaving the rooms and I found Tim Clark who coached us at Richmond a few years back and I went straight to him and said please text me Jed’s number as soon as you can. I thought texting — because I didn’t know his response.

“I basically said “Hey Jed, Bachar here mate ... I want you to know that today was not intentional’.

“(And) an apology of course, from the bottom of my heart.”

The 29-year-old’s only prior disciplinary hiccup was a fine for an altercation with Rhys Palmer against GWS in 2014.

He will miss Richmond’s next two games against Port Adelaide and St Kilda unless he pulls off a successful appeal against the tribunal’s verdict.

SCHOFIELD DODGES BULLET

Eagles defender Will Schofield escaped punishment for his forearm strike at Demons young gun Clayton Oliver.

The West Coast star lashed out at the 19-year-old midway through their round 14 clash over the weekend, catching him on the chin and forcing him to the ground.

Oliver was scolded by fans for his “gold medal dive” after appearing to exaggerate the severity of the blow.

Schofield successfully argued that while he indeed did intent to hit the Melbourne star, the contact was not worth a report.