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EUFA EURO 2024 - Group Stage ⚽ EPL 24/25 starts Aug 17
He has no credibility left it at ABCMy post from 2 years ago was talking about how Gerard Whateley defends Geelong players, a la Ablett's consecutive elbows to people's head that he somehow got off scot free.
You would think that by having a single person running the MRP that we would get some consistency, but Christian seems to ignore prior precedents set by himself and the tribunal when making decisions. IMO this is the single biggest flaw in the whole system right now.
The MRP guidelines are so open for interpretation that precent must be a primary consideration in assessing every incident. It needs to be written into the guidelines so the MRP must consider past cases in the assessment of any new incident.
Precent is what clubs/media/fans used to assess the severity of an offence, and the inconsistency of new findings compared to prior precedent is what is most frustrating and confusing.
Until Michael Christian gets this right I'd expect the tribunal to be in session every single week, with clubs rolling up citing numerous prior examples of identical incidents that were all graded differently.
Not just that, but the speed that he reports cases. It seemed the match had barely finished on Saturday before we were told Lynch was cited. You'd have to wonder how often he watches these incidents and how closely. Took me about 2-3 views each to decide that McKay and Lynch did nothing wrong. Seemingly he was able to reach the opposite conclusion - followed by the mandatory hysteria from opposition fans - before the tribunal actually (and amazingly) took their time and viewed the incidents impartially.
Historically this isn't the case though. In the 2020 Grand Final when Dangerfield knocked out Vlastuin with a raised forearm, Christian stated that "Dangerfield’s actions were not unreasonable in the circumstances and no further action was to be taken".I am of the view that the the direction given to Christian by the AFL is to assess each incident using MRP guidelines and nothing else, and let the tribunal sort out all the cases where the application of the guidelines leads to an incorrect outcome. If he has to do is pull out the table and circle three boxes I can see why its takes 5 mins per incident to reach an outcome.
There's clearly zero depth of thought in what Christian is being asked to do, leaving the tribunal to sort out cases that don't perfectly march the guidelines. This might also explain why why there's no longer a penalty for losing a case at the tribunal.
Plus I think it is on the Match Review Officer to the 'dimmest' view on an incident, whilst the tribunal takes a more balanced view. Its far better for a club to argue a penalty is too harsh than it is for the AFL too argue a penalty is too lenient. Otherwise the tribunal would have to review every incident regardless of what the MRO says.There's clearly zero depth of thought in what Christian is being asked to do, leaving the tribunal to sort out cases that don't perfectly march the guidelines. This might also explain why why there's no longer a penalty for losing a case at the tribunal.
Yes. Revenge is a dish best served cold.My post from 2 years ago was talking about how Gerard Whateley defends Geelong players, a la Ablett's consecutive elbows to people's head that he somehow got off scot free.
He makes it easy to pot him when he abandons his outcome based decision making when it's his former club that's gonna suffer.It’s easy to sit there and pot Christian but let’s be real.
The MRO is the most thankless, easily critical role in the whole AFL Industry.
Did Kane overrule him?So the bloke who's suspended players committing football acts left and right due to the outcome suddenly decides its the action that counts not the outcome?
Thank god Laura Kane stepped in to prevent Christian from saving his old club.