The AFL is changing the goal review system again.
SEN’s Dwayne Russell is of the belief that goal umpires have been directed to signal a goal if they believe it is so, before ARC checks while the ball is being run back to the middle for the restart.
So far in 2024 there has been more dismay than ever surrounding the decisions of goal umpires who have been deferring almost every close call to ARC.
However, goal umpires will begin to signal a goal, if they believe it to be so, before any reviews take place in order to see some cadence and flow return to the game.
“If the soft call of the goal umpire is a goal, my understanding is we might be going back to the old system where it gets checked on the way back to the middle, the umpire just calls goal because that’s he suspects it is and he nows it’s going to get checked on the way back to the middle anyway,” Russell said on SEN.
“That’s a better system than the goal umpire saying, ‘Hang on, hang on, I think it’s a goal, but can we just check it before it goes back to the middle?’.”
It prompted a discussion between Russell, Gerard Whateley and Gerard Healy.
The recent addition of Steve McBurney as the AFL’s new umpire boss has led to the about-face, according to Whateley.
Whateley: “So it allows for the full celebration in the stadium of a goal rather than doing what we’ve been doing which is spoiling the game’s crescendo and climax.”
Russell: “So fans go up when they kick that goal and it’s close to the post and the umpire thinks it’s a goal but he (or she) is not 100 per cent sure.
“He’s going to call because he’s 99 per cent sure and it gets checked back on the way to the middle for the one per cent doubt that he might have.”
Healy: “Somebody with common sense must have just joined their business.”
Russell: “Have they got a new head of umpiring? Is that a coincidence?”
Whateley: “Steve McBurney, as a fresh set of eyes, would go ‘we are ruining our goal umpire here by doing this to them’.
“This might have seemed like a fine idea in someone’s office somewhere, but it’s really hurting our faith in them, their own faith in themselves.
“Let’s just go back to letting them make their call because the system has a safeguard.”
Russell: “I think it does help.
“As much as we all think we know about umpiring, to have a specialist umpire in control of umpiring is a better idea.
“That’s what we’ve got now, a person who understands the dynamics involved in the craft, as opposed to someone who is a bass guitarist to play lead guitar.”
Whateley: “Everyone will wear the overrule which has to happen.
“If it’s a behind and you want to check whether it’s a goal, that’s when you use it in real time and everyone stands around waiting.”
Healy: “It was making the umpiring fraternity look like clowns.
“Who would want to be a goal umpire when you are second-guessing yourself? They’ve looked incompetent.
“Finally, someone has pushed the button.
Whateley: “That is an excellent solution.”
