On the eve of the 2010 season the AFL promised to crack down on players who were found guilty of staging for a free. A first guilty offence was set to earn the player an official warning, a second offence a financial sanction and any subsequent offence would see the player miss a match.
Despite weekly examples of staging across the competition, no player in eight years has ever received an official warning from the match review panel for diving. The AFL has simply swept it under the carpet and it still remains a blight on the game.
Steve Hocking does nothing but impress in his short time at the AFL. I was thrilled to read yesterday the AFL might be, for the first time, having a serious crack at stamping out this tactic.
I was a diver… and that phase of my career remains the biggest regret of my time in the AFL.
As a young tagger I was often the target of physical attention as the opposition tried to protect their best player. After one particular match in which I was tasked with tagging Ben Cousins, Daniel Kerr was on a mission to physically accost me at any opportunity.
Frustrated by the lack of protection from the umpires, my midfield coach at the time, the late Phil Walsh, sat me down and basically said the only way to stop the attacks was to go to ground and exaggerate the contact.
For a number of years this tactic often worked resulting in free kicks off the ball and left the opposition agitated. However, I got into a habit I couldn’t get out of and later in my career, even when I deserved a free-kick the umpires often let it go clearly aware of my reputation.
I finally woke up to it after Power hard man, but usually placid Tom Logan cornered me at the club one day and said “What are you doing? Just stop it.” But the damage was done.
Disappointingly in season 2017 some of our biggest stars were guilty. In round 13, the AFL refused to punish the game's best defender, Alex Rance for his blatant acting when hit with a push from Buddy Franklin, which sucked in the umpire, resulting in a Rance free-kick.
Later in the year he was also able to milk a soft free kick from another Toby Greene brain fade, with some acting better served on Home and Away rather than on a footy field.
These indiscretions were not exclusive to Rance.
Brownlow medallist Patrick Dangerfield was heavily criticised after collapsing to the ground after some minor contact from Adelaide’s Hugh Greenwood. Crows legend Andrew Mcleod took to twitter and accused Dangerfield of a flopping.
Melbounres young gun Clayton Oliver was guilty of flopping as well and the reputation of former North Melbourne forward Lindsay Thomas has long suffered as a result of trying to milk free kicks.
Even Chad Wingard, who regularly risks his safety running back with the flight of ball, was guilty of a poor staging effort in Port Adelaide’s round 12 loss to Essendon.
The AFL finally appears determined to stamp out this smudge on our great game, lets see if their actions are as strong as their words.
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