AFL tipped to crack down on van Rooyen-style contact

AFL tipped to crack down on van Rooyen-style contact

Melbourne coach Simon Goodwin has tipped excessive contact like that which led to the Jacob van Rooyen ‘placing’ saga can be outlawed by the AFL inside a number of years.

Van Rooyen had his named cleared on the league’s appeals board final week after he was initially hit with a two-match suspension.

His placing cost stemmed from a mistimed spoiling try that caught Charlie Ballard excessive and left the Gold Coast defender nursing a sore neck.

Last week, Goodwin mentioned the match overview officer’s evaluation challenged the “fabric of the game” and felt Melbourne needed to contest the cost, partially for clarification over the league’s guidelines.

The Demons premiership coach now expects comparable contact to be taken out of the sport fully within the not too distant future.

His prediction follows a crackdown on harmful tackles amid an enormous deal with the consequences of concussion in world sport.

“I’m a big advocate of protecting the head,” Goodwin instructed Fox Footy.

“But as we go through this journey – we’ve already started and we’re a long way down the path on the tackle – I think we’ll get more clarity on how you contest the ball in the air as well.

AFL Match Centre

“There’s little question the sport will look completely different in a number of years’ time.”

Port Adelaide counterpart Ken Hinkley agreed, declaring he was “barely stunned” the Demons managed to get van Rooyen’s ban overturned.

“The actuality is the sport is performed in a different way at the moment than it was two, years, 5 years, 10 years in the past,” Hinkley mentioned.

“I believe there can be continuous changes to the sport and any hits to the pinnacle can be seen fairly poorly.”

Van Rooyen was under an intense spotlight for several days as he fronted the tribunal and then took his case to the appeals board.

Goodwin lauded the 20-year-old’s ability to handle the pressure.

“It was a giant week for us as a membership and a giant week for clearly Jacob to undergo,” Goodwin mentioned.

“I mentioned on the time that it was about constructing readability for the sport as a lot as something – about what cheap contact would appear like when trying to contest the ball.

“We felt all the time that Jacob’s sole objective was to contest the ball and in the end that’s what was seen to be fit.”

Source: www.perthnow.com.au