A recent incident involving Tomas Bugg and Callum Mills has resulted in calls for players to be issued red cards and sent off in matches.
The AFL, always keen to engage with the football community on rule tinkering, has released a draft send off policy to gather feedback. Here is the draft policy the AFL issued.
Dear Valued Stakeholder
The below policy outlines how a sendoff rule could operate in the AFL. It has been developed by our Diversity team.
As always, we wanted to take the best practice of other sports, but add enough complications to make it close to unworkable. We anticipate the subsequent rules bought in to fix the unintended outcomes of this policy will create seven years work for 7 FTEs.
AFL Send Off Rule
In the event of an incident deemed to be sufficiently un-sportsman* like, an umpire has seven different cards to use.
Blue Card- The umpire is cross but not cross enough to do much about it. Like tooting your horn at someone when they cut you off in traffic. No free kick is issued. They just wave the blue card above their head like crazy and play goes on.
Purple Card- A free kick. For every free kick, an umpire will now stop the game and show the player a purple card and write their name in the book. Seven purple equal a yellow card. At no time should official media refer to it as ‘showing them a purple’.
Green Card- A green card means the player can live in the United States as a legal citizen. This is obviously now a punishment.
Orange Card- The player must go to the bench for ten minutes unless the player holds a Mage counter spell card, level eight, which means the player instead gets to stay on and reverse any free kick. This reversal cannot be applied if the other team plays a Demented Frostcaller or a Kabal Crystal Runner card. Obviously, players holding Druid cards are exempt from receiving any card below a yellow.
Drink Card- When a player hits someone but is a good bloke they receive a Drink card to One Six One.
Yellow card- A reportable event but not enough to be sent off. Any star player can turn a red card into a yellow by showing their ‘I’m an AFL Star get out of Jail Free Card’. The card must be current.
Red Card- A player issued a red card will be sent off for the rest of the game, subject to a full vote via Twitter Poll. Players can appeal the result to the highest court in the land which is apparently the Northern Football League Tribunal.
This simple policy should see violence in the game significantly reduced or not.
Each card will be available for sponsorship, so expect something like ‘And the umpire shows him the Carlton Draught Yellow Card!” or “That Red Card is courtesy of MacDonald’s new Chicken Big Mac. Don’t get hangry and belt someone, eat a Big Mac today.”
Betting markets will be also offered for betting on which colour cards will be issued and to who.
* Sufficiently un-sportsman is purposely not defined so each umpire can make it up on the spot.
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COMMENTS
Marty Moose
Jul 04, 2017
Gold !!!! ... No I don't mean another card, I mean the quote: "At no time should official media refer to it as ‘showing them a purple’." ...
Dael Parry.
Jul 04, 2017
Can we have a card for very bad decisions by Umpires. Perhaps delivered by a Drone, straight from John Longmires box or even from other coaches who might, possibly, be fair minded.
Polymick
Jul 04, 2017
A gold card for you here Titus
Bruce B
Jul 04, 2017
Sounds a great system, and I am all for it. However, I can see with a three umpire system that there is the faint possibility that 3 different coloured cards will be raised, even where there is mandatory colour blindness testing of umpires. So, in such cases, may I suggest that the 4th umpire is used to adjudicate. He or she as the case maybe, does so by mixing the three colours, using an official AFL colour wheel, which all spectator could be issued with, to determine a dominant colour. Once done the 4th umpire refers to the "official" colour list which includes tints and hues to determine the appropriate penalty or benefit.
Such a move may allow the AFL the added luxury of qualifying for annual Arts Grants and attracting wider audience.
westie
Jul 04, 2017
Sheer genius once again.! Gillon should feel threatened.
josh
Jul 04, 2017
What about a Valentines Day Card for Bruce to deliver to Dangerfield every time he touches the ball?
Joseph Beckitt
Jul 04, 2017
Good work! Funny as always
Joseph Beckitt
Jul 04, 2017
....or of course Cyril
Rohan
Jul 04, 2017
Yes. An AFL colour system would most likely need the Dulux colour chart to aid with interpretation.
Buddy Feanklin
Jul 04, 2017
I assume that I have a permanent get out of jail card card?
Ched
Jul 04, 2017
Can it be like weightlifting?
All three umpires get to show a card and it takes at least two of the same to actually apply.
Could stop the game and get some graphics up on the big screen to really excite the fans!
Ben O'B
Jul 04, 2017
That is next level stuff, kudos!
Ben O'B
Jul 04, 2017
That is next level stuff, Bruce B, kudos!
Boris
Jul 04, 2017
A+
Emmi
Jul 04, 2017
All game attendees should be given a alternate set of cards to use for umpiring decisions they are not happy with. A Silver "BALLLL" card held up by the majority of spectators (ie a 'show of hands count' will result in a free kick being given to the home team.
Kim
Jul 04, 2017
RE: Dael Parry. 4 July 2017
Can we have a card for very bad decisions by Umpires.
Fool! Umpires NEVER make bad decisions!!
:)
Ando
Jul 04, 2017
And in the last round of the season the AFL could introduce the first round draft pick card. To be only used at GWS games. .....
Ian
Jul 04, 2017
At the end of the season is there a prize for any player that has collected the whole set. They could then be framed and auctioned off to the foot public.
Ian
Jul 04, 2017
At the end of the season is there a prize for any player that has collected the whole set. They could then be framed and auctioned off to the foot public.
Ian
Jul 04, 2017
At the end of the season is there a prize for any player that has collected the whole set. They could then be framed and auctioned off to the footy public.
Ian
Jul 04, 2017
At the end of the season is there a prize for any player that has collected the whole set. They could then be framed and auctioned off to the footy public.
Someone from Perth
Jul 04, 2017
Just wondering if the AFL has set a limit on the number of good blokes any team can have at one time?
RandomEyes
Jul 04, 2017
It started with pure gold: "The AFL, always keen to engage with the football community on rule tinkering" and went platinum from there!
Can I suggest mirror cards be issued to all Etihad day games when the roof is opened and fans spend the day shining them into the AFL's corporate box until such time as they understand that they need to close the damn roof for all games. If that does not work within a month then fans to be issued with mirrors that narrow the reflected sunlight to a tiny dot and we burn Gil and Co like children do to ants!
Pieman.
Jul 04, 2017
I see trouble with this.ie Sponsorship. Do we stay with a good old Aussie firm, like Taubmans, or do we follow the drive for the international expansion and go with British Paints, or Guangzhou Paint and Coating Co.. This could escalate in all sorts of horrible ways.
Glenda Peters
Jul 04, 2017
Absolutely priceless - but scary!
Pieman.
Jul 04, 2017
This is a massive opportunity for the AFL to once again show socially inclusive politically correct leadership, Yellow, Red, Purple, are all so last season. The AFL's can endear themselves to a whole new market by choosing colours more reflective (wrong word) of our socially inclusive times.
I strongly recommend we include a Taupe card issued to players who tend to disappear into the background for long periods of the game?
Can I suggest you ponder these inspired offerings straight from Dulux:
Yellow: Sunbound, Pale Daffodil, Midas Touch.
Red: Belly Fire, Velvet dream
Purple: .Lilac Fluff, Pink Polar
Blue: True Blue, Wing Commander, Zuni.
Green: Forest Splendour, Tambo Tank, Enigma.
Personally, I'd love an Enigma card.
Pieman.
Jul 04, 2017
This is a massive opportunity for the AFL to once again show socially inclusive politically correct leadership, Yellow, Red, Purple, are all so last season. The AFL's can endear themselves to a whole new market by choosing colours more reflective (wrong word) of our socially inclusive times.
I strongly recommend we include a Taupe card issued to players who tend to disappear into the background for long periods of the game?
Can I suggest you ponder these inspired offerings straight from Dulux:
Yellow: Sunbound, Pale Daffodil, Midas Touch.
Red: Belly Fire, Velvet dream
Purple: .Lilac Fluff, Pink Polar
Blue: True Blue, Wing Commander, Zuni.
Green: Forest Splendour, Tambo Tank, Enigma.
Personally, I'd love an Enigma card.
Ian
Jul 04, 2017
Hearthstone and AFL. Why haven't I mixed these two things before!
Bruce Munday
Jul 04, 2017
There's still something missing here. Surely the red card should be subject to video review which should cover not only the incident leading to the Red Card but also any mitigating circumstances (such a niggling/sledging/etc). If the video review proves successful it could perhaps be extended to other colour cards - or even if not successful.
Tony Tea
Jul 04, 2017
A white card.
Brad
Jul 04, 2017
...And a white card for Richmond, obviously...
Jazz
Jul 04, 2017
I dunno, rock, paper, scissors could work as well.
Stuck in Canberra
Jul 04, 2017
Oh Titus...You make waking up in the morning actually worthwhile. Made it through to the next stage of the Green Card lottery but now that the umpa umpa man is in power, have absolutely no desire to continue surprisingly.
Forgotten Tassie
Jul 04, 2017
Someone From Perth, it is obviously 1 each for WA and SA teams, 4 each for Victorian teams and unlimited for NSW and QLD teams.
Forgotten Tassie
Jul 04, 2017
Don't forget the Race Card, the only card that can be produced by a player to negate any of the other cards, allowing him to call in any number of character references. A player presenting the Race Card will get a week off his sentence for each character reference until his sentence is zero, at which point any additional references will be carried over for use in future hearings.
Hollywood Chihuahua
Jul 04, 2017
This is a reasonable starting draft policy but I think it needs quite a bit more work. For one thing, it fits on a couple of pages. Any AFL policy worth its salt should run to 25 pages at least.
What is notably absent is any guidance on what happens when the Tribunal overturns an umpires red card. Clearly we need the equivalent of the Duckworth-Lewis system to assess the points impact that the loss of the red carded player had to recalculate which team would have won the game if the player had not been red carded. I look forward to reading your next draft incorporating this concept. Keep up the good work on these exciting policy initiatives.
Gunga Din
Jul 04, 2017
Duck card - hand to the ump while saying I wasn't tackled high but Joel gets a free so here's my card and I'd like a soft free too please
Courage card - when your not that tough but want to smack an opponents head into the point post (only available against Port)
Dive card - if Buddy comes within 15 metres you can fall over and get a free (must be theatrical) & then have Bruce, BT rave about winning a marking contest against Caleb Daniel
Billious
Jul 04, 2017
What colour card would incidents like Nick Riewoldts umpire con get. Apparently according to Nick and others who loved the incident it happens 15 times in every game where players do that although I have only seen it twice Boomer Harvey and Nick's on the weekend. If the umpire falls for that 15 times a game as suggested in Nick's own defence, then we need a rainbow card to send the dumb umpire who falls for it off and umpire the games in arrears by television review.
Eddy Mcguire
Jul 04, 2017
Yes clearly the "good bloke" concept is biased against Collingwood, though, we would need some additional draft picks to compensate
Andrew Goff
Jul 05, 2017
Surely the colours are too clear! Try:
Charcoal
Asphalt
Cerise
Tangerine
Straw
Opal
Rainforest.
Furthermore, all cards should be recorded by the goal umpires using appropriate flagging techniques to ensure that the crowd is able to see what is going on. It's only common sense.
Helen
Jul 05, 2017
Fabulously idea.
the Original Buzz
Jul 05, 2017
Of course the goal umpires will need matching colour flags.
Andrew L
Jul 05, 2017
Brilliant. This is a much needed simplification to the system that Titus proposes.
Harridiculous
Jul 07, 2017
Would have to be delivered by the 4th umpire wearing the obligatory pilot jacket while Kenny Loggins streams over the PA system.