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Was talking with an American musician friend last Friday, he's out for a couple of weeks and the subject got onto gambling in sport.

He's convinced now that major sport in the U.S is influenced (rigged) because of the amount of money on the line. We all know the boxing has been for eons but now it's becoming harder to argue in other sports. He says some decisions just don't stand up.

Tonight proves he has a point...

 

9 minutes ago, Skin Deeamond said:

I cannot believe how that game was destroyed by bad umpiring which appeared to be so heavily biased to Essendon. Marks not paid to GWS, clear frees not paid to GWS, whereas completely ridiculous frees were plucked out of nowhere to Essendon, turning the momentum of the game. A disgraceful performance by the AFL.

Something for us all to look forward to for the rest of the season ....... as many free kicks as it takes to them in the Forward Line in the last quarter of every game......

GWS actually looked as though they had resigned themselves to losing that Game. Behold the Coliseum spectacle of the last quarter....

 

Umpires should not be miked. There is no good reason.


35 minutes ago, Demon_spurs said:

Not often I feel empathy for GWS but tonight that was horrendous 

On tonight's display, i am now convinced that umpires deliberately go out to influence games a particular way (via AFL directive).

So long as the competition is churning out money, Gil and his cronies couldn't give a hoot about the sanctity of the game.

The BHF was in full flight

 

Dead set embarrassing this review system. Starting to be swayed for calls on ‘Challenges’ by the coaches. The whole world saw that ball was touched in 5 seconds of footage. What kind of system are they running? 

Giants threw it away, umps were awful, but seriously I reckon the Giants were thinking about future pay days. Anyway Davis is a gun, don't mind him at all. Still hate Toby Greene.


I also think I saw the guy doing the score review run from the ground and is still driving as we speak, next stop BKK.

6 minutes ago, DaisyDeeciple said:

I also think I saw the guy doing the score review run from the ground and is still driving as we speak, next stop BKK.

[censored] that, we don't want him.

1 hour ago, Dee Zephyr said:

Dead set embarrassing this review system. Starting to be swayed for calls on ‘Challenges’ by the coaches. The whole world saw that ball was touched in 5 seconds of footage. What kind of system are they running? 

That camera was supposed to be unplugged, someone screwed up.

Shameful umpiring.  They lack integrity in their work, then they demand respect!  Hypocritical!  Just as well their were no GWS supporters, otherwise they would have serious 'respect' booing.

 

A thought:  Maybe the AFL were 'compensating' Ess for the controversial umpiring in the ANZAC day game which they lost?  Or to help them climb the ladder to keep prime time ratings up?  Both?

8 hours ago, DaisyDeeciple said:

Giants threw it away, umps were awful, but seriously I reckon the Giants were thinking about future pay days. Anyway Davis is a gun, don't mind him at all. Still hate Toby Greene.

Yep, Giants certainly threw it away. Game should have been over before the $hitshow started. For all their ‘Guns’ no one stood up when it mattered, apart from Davis, he was the only one that looked likely to win the game for the Giants when the Dons just bombarded the Giants’ defensive 50 in the last 15 minutes. 


1 hour ago, Dee Zephyr said:

Yep, Giants certainly threw it away. Game should have been over before the $hitshow started. For all their ‘Guns’ no one stood up when it mattered, apart from Davis, he was the only one that looked likely to win the game for the Giants when the Dons just bombarded the Giants’ defensive 50 in the last 15 minutes. 

Giants may have missed some chances but it is no reason to not adjudicate the game fairly. 

Ess six goal final quarter was on the back of umpires shifting momentum for them at every opportunity.  At one stage (half time or in the 3rd qtr?) frees were 15 v 9.  At the end: 29 v 14.  When umpires see a big diff in frees at 3/4 time they try to even them up in the last qtr even if only for 'the optics'.  Absolutely none of that last night.  The soft frees to Ess and the frees not paid to GWS were game changers.

With 2 min to go the umpires hadn't got them over the line.  Enter 'score review'!!!  Well not quite.  No umpire called for a review despite the pleas of 'touched'.  The central umpire then bounced the ball before the mandatory 'score review' was completed!! 

Had the touched 'goal' (which equalled the score) been correctly called a point with GWS in control of the ball who knows if Ess would have made up the diff in the last 90 sec. 

Certainly looked like match fixing.

Edited by Lucifer's Hero

Time for a "whistle blower" to expose things for what they really are.......

Didn't watch the game but yet again, a team with fewer scoring shots got the win by kicking straighter. GWS should have ump-proofed themselves by kicking straight.

11 hours ago, Ethan Tremblay said:

Corrupt umpires or are they just completely incompetent? 

Incompetent.

The AFL is the corrupt entity, for permitting lousy umpiring and farcical goal reviews to go on week after week after week.

23 minutes ago, Lucifer's Hero said:

Giants may have missed some chances but it is no reason to not adjudicate the game fairly. 

Ess six goal final quarter was on the back of umpires shifting momentum for them at every opportunity.  At one stage (half time or in the 3rd qtr?) frees were 15 v 9.  At the end: 29 v 14.  When umpires see a big diff in frees at 3/4 time they try to even them up in the last qtr even if only for 'the optics'.  Absolutely none of that last night.  The soft frees to Ess and the frees not paid to GWS were game changers.

With 2 min to go the umpires hadn't got them over the line.  Enter 'score review'!!!  Well not quite.  No umpire called for a review despite the pleas of 'touched'.  The central umpire then bounced the ball before the mandatory 'score review' was completed!! 

Had the touched 'goal' (which equalled the score) been correctly called a point with GWS in control of the ball who knows if Ess would have made up the diff in the last 90 sec. 

Certainly looked like match fixing.

All good points Luci, I think most of us are getting tired of seeing the game in the news for the wrong reasons. The last quarter umpiring was as bad as I’ve seen for a long time. Missed throws by ESS players, marks not paid to GWS, the non-review almost made my remote go through the telly. 

Just to clarify how it works. Is it up to the umps to hold off for a review? I read they neglected the GWS appeals, or is it up to the part-timers upstairs to send the message down to hold off on the bounce?

The inconsistencies are mind boggling. Some might remember two years ago in Sydney, Richmond lost a game after an exact incident was reviewed and Bolton’s goal was deemed touched against GWS and Cameron took it up the other end for a match winning goal. It really is below amateurish at the moment.


23 minutes ago, Dee Zephyr said:

All good points Luci, I think most of us are getting tired of seeing the game in the news for the wrong reasons. The last quarter umpiring was as bad as I’ve seen for a long time. Missed throws by ESS players, marks not paid to GWS, the non-review almost made my remote go through the telly. 

Just to clarify how it works. Is it up to the umps to hold off for a review? I read they neglected the GWS appeals, or is it up to the part-timers upstairs to send the message down to hold off on the bounce?

The inconsistencies are mind boggling. Some might remember two years ago in Sydney, Richmond lost a game after an exact incident was reviewed and Bolton’s goal was deemed touched against GWS and Cameron took it up the other end for a match winning goal. It really is below amateurish at the moment.

The closest I could find is: GWS are fuming!

But Fox Footy understands the club is privately fuming that officials blatantly ignored an AFL directive to spend more time getting review calls right...A private memo was sent to score reviewers two weeks ago reminding them they could take as much time as they needed to get decisions right.

I suspect 'officials' there means the umpire who didn't wait. 

Garry Lyon:  "We’ve got two systems in place; if an umpire says yeah, we can review it, then we might spend 45 seconds on it and take our time looking at it and use all the angles in the world. If there’s no review, you’ve got 20 seconds left before we bounce the ball". 

Because the the umpires ignored the 'touched' call there was less time for the mandatory review. 

It is easily fixed.  Central umpire does not bounce the ball until he gets the all clear from the score reviewer. 

Did anyone notice which umpire hurriedly bounced the ball?

Edited by Lucifer's Hero

1 hour ago, Lucifer's Hero said:

  No umpire called for a review despite the pleas of 'touched'.  The central umpire then bounced the ball before the mandatory 'score review' was completed!! 

 

Quote

 

funny because i remember a similar situation a few weeks ago when a melbourne goal was touched, the umpires went out of there way to stop the game have the goal reviewd and took the goal off Melbourne, it was in compltete contrast to what happened to Essondon

Edited by don cordner4

 

The way it works in cricket is pretty good. The captain can call for a review, then there is a set checklist they go through to work out whether to overturn the umpire's decision. And part of that is a procedure for if the video or other evidence is not conclusive.

 

I also note in rugby league there are often questionable tries and they "go upstairs" to see if the ball hit the grass, or if the player lost control of it, etc. (The ref will sometimes send it "upstairs" of his own volition just to be sure.) Multiple angles and usually clean as a whistle. The cameras used by the AFL look like they came out of a "photo journalist Barbie" set bought at a garage sale.

 

But in the AFL, everything is always vague and inconsistent, with poor rationale, behind-covering after the event and later the powers that be come out and say (explicitly or tacitly) nothing to see here.

Touched off the boot can easily be exploited by a player attempting to smother the ball.  Just flick your fingers back at the appropriate moment.  Easy as pie.  Who is to say it hasn't already happened.

So we now have another grey area which will continue to be a grey area.  Unless it's an obvious touched off the boot I'd pay it as a goal.

But what is an obvious touched off the boot?  Again,  just another grey area without a definitive answer.  Hot spot?  Technology often brings its own issues.  I don't trust the technology in cricket even though the graphics paint nice pictures.  Especially ball tracking. 

I prefer the rub of the green alternative ... take the good with the bad and get on with it.  You want perfection?  You won't get it.


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