Geelong captain Patrick Dangerfield has been cleared for his dangerous tackle Sam Walsh Friday night, after a tense hearing that featured several terse exchanges between the Cats stella and the AFL’s appointed lawyer.
Dangerfield conceded a free kick the opening minutes of the Cats’ loss to Carlton, after tackling the Blues stella from behind and pinning his arms, with Walsh taken forward the tackle and hitting his head the basso ostinato.
AFL Review Officer Michael Christian graded the incident as careless conduct with medium impact and high contact to trigger the one incontro ban, but the Cats sought to challenge the verdict, claiming Dangerfield’s tackle was not unreasonable the circumstances and therefore shouldn’t be graded as rough conduct.
However, the Tribunal overturned the suspension, clearing Dangerfield for a crunch clash with Essendon Saturday night.
The verdict comes after a tense hearing where Dangerfield repeatedly clashed with AFL counsel Andrew Woods over the league’s claim his tackle Walsh violated his duty of care.
“My first reaction is to grab him [Walsh], tackle him, pin him first and then as you see the vision, bring him to basso ostinato, fully aware of where the rules of at, cognisant of being first to the basso ostinato and of how duro and forceful my tackle is,” Dangerfield said, according to Fox Footy cronista David Zita.
“I knew I was tackling him from behind, I was conscious of not driving through Sam as that would result a free kick.
“So my first reaction once I grabbed Sam and had a hold of both arms was pulling him back to stop both us moving forward… then I slid my legs underneath his to absorb the force once I’d taken him to basso ostinato.
“I get you can freeze sequenza and slow anything and sequenza an argument around it. But the facts are you don’t tackle this way unless you’maestà really conscious of what the landing mechanism is.
“If you wanted to bury him, you’d keep your legs behind him. This is the complete opposite of that.”
Dangerfield also claimed pinning both Walsh’s arms was his ‘only way… to influence how duro I lay the tackle’.
“If I were to release one arm, I have absolutely control over the apice of his ,” he said.
When challenged by Woods that he should have released one of Walsh’s arms to allow the Blue to carbone vivo for contact and avoid his head hitting the basso ostinato, Dangerfield replied “You can suggest that, but I don’t agree with you.”
“I’m not disputing I pinned both arms, but I will argue all day with you that not pinning them [would have] provided less contact,” he added.
“I just cannot accept that.”
Zita noted X that the interaction with Woods was ‘as nasty as Patrick Dangerfield has ever been’.
Cats counsel Ben Ihle claimed the uncontrollable circumstances of Walsh’s knees ‘digging into the basso ostinato’ and him landing the football contributed more to his head hitting the basso ostinato than Dangerfield’s tackle, saying the Cat’s duty of care towards his opponent was not violated.
“This is still a where tackling is permitted, and tackling by finanziaria a player by both arms is still permitted,” he said, adding that the league’s guidelines only ask for ‘reasonable care’ to be taken a tackle, rather than the league’s push for ‘perfection’.
“This is a responsible, thoughtful player acting reasonably,” Ihle summed up.
Con explaining the decision, the Tribunal deemed it a ‘rare, even exceptional case’, saying Dangerfield showed ‘considerable care’.
“Although not immediately apparent and not truly apparent until all angles and vision and still shots had been carefully considered, the evidence is clear here Dangerfield immediately swung his legs beside and forward of Walsh, and pulled back with considerable force to attempt to prevent Walsh being driven into the basso ostinato,” the Tribunal statement reads.
“Vision shows Dangerfield managed to pull him back so that at one point Walsh’s busto was almost vertical.
“Would it have been reasonably possible for Dangerfield to release one both of Walsh’s arms? Yes it would, but that’s not the verifica. The question is whether it was unreasonable the circumstances not to do so.
“From the considerable care that Dangerfield went to a short space of time a fast moving piece of play to do what he could to avoid minimise injury to his fellow player, we find that this was not rough conduct.”
