Another busy night at the AFL Tribunal has concluded, with three players receiving bans.

St Kilda’s Anthony Caminiti (striking), Collingwood’s Taylor Adams and Essendon’s Zach Merrett (dangerous tackles) were all charged by the MRO for their respective Gather Round incidents, but only Caminiti’s charge was successfully downgraded.

Merrett and Adams will both miss the blockbuster Anzac Day clash, while Caminiti received a three-match ban.

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To open the evening, Merrett’s ban was upheld.

Essendon challenged the charge of rough conduct given to Merrett while if that failed, they argued the impact should be graded low instead of medium.

The AFL argued he placed Tom Sparrow in a vulnerable position and either slung, drove or rotated him into the ground with excessive force, fulfilling two of the four dot points that can encompass a dangerous tackle.

Merrett explained he attempted a normal tackle, but Tom Sparrow’s “sidestep” threw Merrett off-balance and he couldn’t set his feet. He said he felt he didn’t have Sparrow “in any bit of a vulnerable position”.

League representative Nick Pane argued: “At all times your right arm was pulling Sparrow down towards the ground.”

Merrett responded: “I respectfully disagree. I wasn’t pulling him directly towards the ground. I’m doing everything to pull him onto me. It feels like his body connects with mine as I hit the ground as well.

“You react on habits and instinct and we’re certainly coached and educated massively around the safety element. I’m hoping my habit or instinct was to do that (pull him onto me).

“Players with the ball are going to try and fight tackles, I felt Tom used his right arm to semi-push my chest, so I’m trying to pull him closer to me to not allow any space for him to get the ball out.”

Bombers representative Ben Ihle went as far to suggest Sparrow was the “prime mover” that saw him tip forward in the tackle.

“Just as Merrett gets hold of Sparrow, his feet go out underneath him and Sparrow. It’s also clear Sparrow is pulled down onto Merrett. It’s demonstrated plainly by the footage,” Ihle said.

“Merrett’s right arm is fully cocked. He’s not pulling Sparrow down with the right arm, rather he is holding on.

“Sparrow is trying to burst through the front-on tackle. The Tribunal should ask: Who is the prime mover in the direction of Sparrow tipping forward? In my submission, it is Sparrow trying to free himself of Merrett’s grip.

“We’re not disputing Sparrow’s head made contact with the turf … what we’re saying is that this was not a dangerous tackle because it was not unreasonable in the circumstances.”

AFL Tribunal chairman Jeff Gleeson found: “Zach Merrett’s explanation of the tackle he applied to Tom Sparrow was honest and forthright.

“The difficulty for Merrett, however, is that by holding onto Sparrow’s jumper – and in our view pulling him to the ground – combined with the force applied by Merrett around Sparrow’s body with his left arm, there was a real risk of Sparrow’s head colliding forcefully with the ground.

“A reasonable player in Merrett’s position would have realised there was some vulnerability for Sparrow because his right arm was pinned, would’ve realised the tackle was both pulling and pushing in such a way that Sparrows head was driving towards the ground with force and that there was a real risk Sparrow wouldn’t land entirely on Merrett.

“For those reasons, we find this was a dangerous tackle.

“As to impact, while there was no injury to Sparrow, the force with which Sparrow’s head hit the ground was plain to see.

“The potential for injury arose and the appropriate classification of impact is medium.”

In the second case of the night, St Kilda’s Anthony Caminiti copped a three-week ban for striking and concussing Collingwood’s Nathan Murphy.

The Tribunal agreed with the Saints that the incident was careless rather than intentional.

The AFL requested a five-match ban if the strike was deemed intentional, and a four-match ban if it was deemed careless, while the Saints argued four or three depending on the grading.

The Tribunal did not permit a victim statement from Murphy into evidence. It centered around Murphy slipping slightly which the Tribunal said was already apparent from the vision of the incident.

“As part of his way to defend me, he would instigate contact first … as a forward, as part of my craft, I’m trying to get away from him and create space … putting my forearm in his chest and therefore creating space between him and me,” Caminiti said.

“I was anticipating the ball to get launched into the forward line. I momentarily looked at Murphy, attempted to put my forearm into his chest, anticipating a marking contest that didn’t happen.

“At the time, I was completely unaware I’d hit him anywhere near the head or chin, I thought it was just a normal hit to the chest. Now looking at the vision, it’s clear I must’ve accidentally clipped him in the chin.”

Caminiti rejected the suggestion he was retaliating for Murphy hitting him first, arguing he was repeating a pushing action he had used multiple times throughout the contest, and reached out to the Pies defender after the game.

“I was very remorseful and wanted to say how sorry I was for the action. I felt quite bad at the outcome. I just wanted to see if he was ok and just wanted to apologise,” he said.

“I don’t think I had time to process that he’d dropped so much, especially in the heat of the game in that last quarter.”

He added: “It was never my intention to swing, my whole intention was to push.

“At other times during the game, the force (of that action) would’ve been the exact same … I’d describe it as an attempted push to the chest with my forearm.”

In reaching its decision, the Tribunal said it noted Caminiti at no point looked at Murphy after the incident, which was consistent with someone who did not intend to strike and did not realise he had struck his opponent to the head.

It also noted Murphy’s body lowered before impact and “contributed significantly” to the head-high contact.

A three-match ban, it said, took into account Caminiti not arguing he didn’t strike Murphy and not arguing it was severe impact.

It said Caminiti understood the consequences of his careless conduct.

To conclude the night Collingwood tried to downgrade the grading of Taylor Adams’ dangerous tackle on Seb Ross from medium to low impact, which would result in a fine.

Adams said there was force generated by both Tom Mitchell and Beau McCreery during the tackle, with both losing balance.

“I’m doing everything I can to minimise impact. I know he’s in a vulnerable position and it’s my duty of care to make sure the impact he experiences isn’t severe and thinking about myself as well so that I don’t get injured,” Adams explained.

“I’ve tried to slow down the fall by moving my centre of gravity outwards. I’m putting my arm down to brace for both of our falls.

“Tom’s got half a foot on the ground, he’s got his whole weight falling onto us. Beau, he likes tackling that much that he’s tackling Tom to try and tackle Ross. There’s almost 180 kilos of weight going through them.

“I tried to protect both Seb and myself. It’s lucky I did, otherwise he would’ve hit the ground harder.

“Seb actually mentioned to me after this that he was able to get a handball away.”

Adams became agitated at some of the questions with Jeff Gleeson having to tell the Magpie he was not getting criticised, just being asked questions.

“If you were to look at Adams’ actions alone, not taking into account Mitchell or McCreery, in my submission this would be a dangerous tackle. The fact there are two other players in the tackle doesn’t lessen impact, if anything it might magnify it,” Nick Pane said for the AFL.

Tribunal chairperson Jeff Gleeson acknowledged during the hearing he was “not aware of another one (case) where there’s been what’s effectively a gang tackle.”

In a testament to the case’s difficulty, Gleeson spent 10 minutes preparing instructions for the jury, before another 15 minutes were spent hashing them out.

After deliberating for half an hour, the Tribunal upheld Adams’ charge.

The Tribunal found Ross was brought to the ground “overwhelmingly” due to the force applied by Adams.

It was not sufficiently satisfied Adams did enough to reduce the momentum or the force of the tackle or to release Ross to minimise impact.

– with Max Laughton

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