I see Collard had his suspension reduced by half to 4 weeks with 2 suspended. It just goes to show how woke and pretentious society is today when all he did was call someone a faggot.
Last time I looked a faggot was a Scottish meatball made from pork.
Good thing he didn’t call the person a c*nt. He would have got 10 weeks for demeaning women.
Has he got 2 more on top of that for Striking,or was that included in the 4?
PS - If his Suspension stood at 9 weeks,were the AFL going to Suspend players more for serious Striking?I Won’t hold my breath!
It is a derogatory homophobic slur don’t be stupid and pull the woke shit either. It’s 2026 not 1976 where racism and bigotry were obviously accepted.
Such slurs are not acceptable.
But striking and assault,particularly serious assault seems to be a lesser offence these days,…go figure!
its a hard one as racism, bigotry etc we do not condone and take a hard line with it and unless its a Barry Hall swing we let it slide.
Not sure we have the mix right you’re correct.
Interesting case this and even more so given it all played out at the same time as the Zak Butters case.
Collard accused of a homophobic slur, by an opponent post match, not heard by an official and not reported to an official during the game. He said, He said case over one letter m or f.
Butters accused of calling an umpire a cheat, reported in the match. He said he said case again over a couple of words.
Both players firmly deny saying what they were accused of and both cases could be argued that the player or umpire could have easily misheard or misinterpreted what was said.
Both players found guilty, the homophobic slur gets 9 weeks, with 2 weeks being suspended and calling the umpire a cheat gets a $1500 fine.
Both completely unacceptable if true but the penalties couldn’t be further apart.
Both cases appealed, Collard still found guilty but sentenced reduced to 4 weeks and Butters gets off on a technicality over procedural errors by a tribunal member but not cleared of his alleged comments.
what we will never know is did he call him a faggot or a maggot as Lance claims. To me we need to stamp this behaviour out but 9 weeks for a sledge and three weeks for striking doesnt pass the pub test
Exactly, and given how the AFL seems to be so outcomes or potential outcomes based with their suspensions for striking, tackling or bumping with bigger penalties if the player is injured.
How many players miss a game or several weeks because they’ve been sledged in a previous match? And is it a racial or homophobic slur if you are not that race or sexual persuasion?
A sledge yes, but a totally unacceptable one.
In this day and age it cannot be condoned. Bur as has beed said, did he use that actual word.
I need to find and read the findings , because there was a line that disturbed me. I can not remember the exact worlds, but along the lines, AFL is a hard game, we can not expect to eradicate such behaviour.
Not exact words I know, but seemed totally out of place. To me it has left the door wide open do dismiss future cases like this by putting it in the too hard basket.
Gee Viper. No need to get your frilly panties in a twist. The post was more tongue in cheek than anything if you’ll excuse the pun. 9 weeks for calling someone a name which is more than Gaff got for whacking Brayshaw and Hall on Staker seems a bit much for mine.
Fortunately common sense prevailed and it was reduced, but I’m not sure what the original tribunal was thinking.
This what the review panel said a/man.
“We observe that football is a hard game. It is highly competitive, particularly at its higher levels. It is commonplace that players can employ language from time to time which is racist, sexist or homophobic whilst on the field,”
At the end of day the AFl is an Amateur comp just look at the way they handled the Essendon drug saga, they never thought Wada would come over the top and find them guilty, that was one scandal they couldn’t keep in house.
The AFL will rebuke its own appeals board after it made jaw-dropping claims that it is “commonplace” for players to use “racist, sexist or homophobic” language as the three-person panel downgraded Lance Collard’s nine-week ban to a two-game suspension.
The appeals board led by King’s Counsels William Houghton also included former player Steven Jurica and fellow King’s Counsel Georgina Coughlan.
The appeals board upheld the tribunal’s initial guilty finding but said the initial penalty was manifestly excessive and cited Collard’s age, Indigenous heritage and the fact his opponent was not personally offended by his homophobic slur.
With that decision it throws out everything we thought was right. How could a group of lawyers come to that conclusion.
Maybe the original penalty was strong, but didn’t it need to be!
A second offence, maybe that is why the original penalty was as harsh as it was.
Blows my mind.
And here is the virtue signalling AFL CEO
Thanks TT, was just coming in to post the same.
Glad to see them refute the verdict.
Lol you don’t think the peanut Dillon was behind it?
Just another engineered outcome from an amateurish corrupt comp.
An AFL free panel.
Hence the rebuttal of the decision.
So long as Striking warrants a bigger penalty,Dillon.
When a Guilty Verdict is reached,are the AFL going to apply a bigger penalty,…?
Don’t think so!
With due respect A/m an AFL free tribunal is a load of rubbish it would still be manipulated by the AFL.