Opinion Playing for frees - it's now a big part of the game.

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Jello_B said:
Can’t be that great, check our free kick differential for the year.
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By-product of your attack on the ball carier and relentless pressure. Sometimes the tackle is sloppy.

I don't mean that in a negative way either.

Sometimes, giving a free kick away creates a stoppage down the line and a defensive reset to stop quick play.

A lot of good teams have negative free kick differential.




You guys are good at milking frees though.



I don't like it, but if you can take advantage in weak umpiring why not exploit it. No different to taking advantage of a weak opponent.


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FR0GGY said:
Horrible, fine them massively post game.
I don’t think I’ve seen one as bad as that Brisbane bloke on the south western flank throw himself in the air.
The one creeping in seems to be in the tackle the player lays down for a bit to try and get a dangerous tackle, or the crane their head over to get it to hit the ground first.
I think it was in the freo Melbourne game a player did this, stupidity at its finest.
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The AFL said they were going to fine players for staging.

Did it for 1 or 2 players, then as usual became weak as piss.
 
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Clubs are rising up against the MRO’s crackdown on sling tackles with three appeals lodged from the weekend’s rounds.
There is growing angst around the league about match review officer Michael Christian’s willingness to hand out one-week suspensions with four players nabbed this round, the latest being Adelaide star Rory Laird.

Laird, who was best-on-ground in Sunday’s win over Brisbane, is the 20th player this season to be suspended for a dumping tackle.

He was pinged for driving Brownlow Medallist Lachie Neale into the turf in the third quarter.

Carlton, Sydney and Fremantle will roll the dice at the tribunal on Tuesday night, appealing Christian’s classification of a hard tackle.

The Crows are also likely to appeal with a final call to be made on Tuesday morning.

Blues midfielder Adam Cerra was nabbed for a tackle on Sydney’s Tom Hickey where the Swans ruckman’s head bounced off the turf.

Swans veteran Luke Parker is defending a tackle which saw him pin the arms of Sam Walsh before dumping him to the ground.

Fremantle midfielder Jaeger O’Meara was also caught in the crackdown after a heavy tackle on Melbourne’s Charlie Spargo.
 

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The umpires are bad and then the MRO are making the situation worse.
Lachie Neale couldn't have tried any harder for his head to touch the ground, pathetic. Just like the Houston one.
But then in our Geelong game, Tom Stewart pins Pedlar from the back and drives his head, front first into the ground and nothing happens.
 
NSolis said:
Been part of the game for a while. Shrugging tackles to force them high or going head first over the ball into a tackler are both tactics to milk frees. Throwing yourself forward to turn a tackle from behind into an in the back free is also a big one.

Main one I've seen more of this year is the off the ball stuff, with a fourth umpire to keep an eye on things. Like the Weightman one against Gold Coast this week. Fogarty did something similar earlier in the year, albeit slightly less egregious.
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This is spot on and it is really dangerous. The Joel Selwood lift the arms up to get a high free kick is not too bad - annoying, but not dangerous.

It was dangerous when they were trying to protect the head by paying a free kick for any high contact and players were deliberately putting their head down in to a tackle to draw a free kick. Thankfully they stopped paying that free and it has gone out of the game.

The one now though is players contributing to being slung into the ground to try and get a free kick for "the dangerous tackle". Just like when they brought the very strict head contact rule in, this is being exploited and making the game more dangerous than what it is.

There should be no frees for dangerous tackles, but harsh penalties after the game if there is one. This will stop players playing for the free and they will go back to protecting themselves more which should result in less injuries over all. Big fines and loss of matches will still deter the players from performing a dangerous tackle on game day.
 
cmndstab said:
Agreed, it's been a problem for years and years. My memory of it being a big issue goes back to around 2006, but chances are it's been longer than that. Someone like Joel Selwood built an entire career out of exploiting a rule designed to protect the head, by deliberately trying to incur high contact, and was lauded as a brave leader as a result.

There is exactly one way to solve the problem - you identify players who are staging, and you penalise them significantly enough that it's not worth doing it. But the AFL is massively gun-shy on doing it, and every time they try, there is enough blowback that they stop again. It still amuses me that Kane Cornes was the one guy who got the book thrown at him for staging and then the AFL never did it to any other player after that.
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If every player was decapitated just before taking the field we could probably get rid of the high tackle rule and be done with it. Don’t argue with my rum! It never lies!
 
AFL building a nice dossier of evidence of displaying duty of care at the expense of common sense.

Of course the cannon fodder served up as the patsy will be selected with bias.
 

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Interloperer said:
When hasn't it been part of the game?

This thread should be evidence of the harmful effect of leaded petrol on the memory of the boomer populace.
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Slippery Pete said:
Has anybody here noticed that big arc with a 50 on it? Is that new?
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So it’s not changed at all? You don’t see any increase in the number of players doing it … or the frequency of it?

Interloper you are probably right … it’s old people like me that are the problem. Maybe you struggle to hold your attention on the game for long periods? Or maybe you can’t take your eyes off your phone and just look up when the crowd cheers - must be tough for whipper snappers like tossing nowadays being so distracted all the time?

Pete, not sure if you are being sarcastic or are actually confused … but you are pretty old and usually intoxicated so we will laugh, shake our collective heads and utter our usual condolences.

But thank you both for your oh-so witty contributions to the discussion … hilarious and entertaining as always.
 
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Drugs Are Bad Mackay? said:
If the head hits the ground in a tackle, fine. One game suspension. We'll wear that.

But the tackled player should miss a game too. Make sure they're okay
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I often think this ... did the player even go off for HIA? If not then how can it possibly be medium? The Lions must be held to account for not looking after their players.

I mean if Neale puts a legal lock on the AFL and says look at this example - I was brutally slung to the ground, Laird was rightly suspended for using his superman powers to lift me up and drive my head into the ground for a medium impact ... but I was not even tested!!!!
 
baldandbroke said:
I've noticed this more than ever in 2023.

AFL is more about getting the free by exaggerating / simulating illegal contact than ever before.

I heard David King validate it with a call on the weekend when J Cameron threw the head back with no contact as "It's a good sell".

Cody Weightman nearly turned the game with some of the worst examples I have seen against the Suns.

Butters and Rozee do it every other contest.

Tex and Keays both played for frees yesterday.

Unfortunately, my usual comparison is against Ice Hockey ... which I have to say, these playoffs I have seen it there too.

If there is no way to stamp it out, if the opposition do it and win contests with a dive / arms flung / making a tackle appear dangerous / throwing back the head ... is it time to accept that it is part of the game and go down the Premier League route and get professional about it?

Are we ever going to win a Grand Final without winning the free kicks that matter by making sure the umps pay them / getting a couple of freebies that were never there but exploit the difficulty in umpiring?

I suppose it is important to remember that finals are umpired differently, so the line may not be as far on the awfulness scale as I have feared, but there is a line.

Thoughts?
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Players are becoming pathetic. If you did that back when footy was footy you would get your block knocked off.
 
baldandbroke said:
I often think this ... did the player even go off for HIA? If not then how can it possibly be medium? The Lions must be held to account for not looking after their players.

I mean if Neale puts a legal lock on the AFL and says look at this example - I was brutally slung to the ground, Laird was rightly suspended for using his superman powers to lift me up and drive my head into the ground for a medium impact ... but I was not even tested!!!!
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Like Rozee the other week.

Bloke went down like he'd been shot. Close game...nah no need for a HIA. :rolleyes:
 
As this thread is about playing for frees, I’ll stick to the subject. Playing for frees has been around for decades. Exaggerating in a contested marking contest to make it look like a push in the back, throwing your head back for a high tackle. Dragging a ball under an opponent you’re tackling to try and get “holding the ball”
I think for the most part the AFL has improved in this area with specific umpire training. Sports like AFL are often reactive. It wasn’t until Hawthorn kept walking the ball through for a point did they change the rules to prevent that. Players or coaches get smart and the AFL does eventually catch on.
 
Drugs Are Bad Mackay? said:
Staging can be fixed easily. Just need switched on umpires who understand the game

So we're doomed
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Here's an easy way to stop it. Any player who is found guilty of staging for frees or ducking to initiate head high tackles / bumps (and increase the chance for their own concussion) causes the team they play for next season to lose a set amount off their salary cap - maybe 50k per offence?
Players would stop staging instantly as they would face being run out of the game.
Coaches would not put up with players making it more difficult financially to recruit new players and teammates would not put up with another player potentially taking money off their next contract.
Said player would also expect a $50k per offence haircut on their next contract with a new club (if he could get one) if his current club want to trade him to avoid the penalties caused by the player in the current season.
Now obviously this is the nuclear option, and would never be implemented, but it would work!
 
Mutineer said:
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Clubs are rising up against the MRO’s crackdown on sling tackles with three appeals lodged from the weekend’s rounds.
There is growing angst around the league about match review officer Michael Christian’s willingness to hand out one-week suspensions with four players nabbed this round, the latest being Adelaide star Rory Laird.

Laird, who was best-on-ground in Sunday’s win over Brisbane, is the 20th player this season to be suspended for a dumping tackle.

He was pinged for driving Brownlow Medallist Lachie Neale into the turf in the third quarter.

Carlton, Sydney and Fremantle will roll the dice at the tribunal on Tuesday night, appealing Christian’s classification of a hard tackle.

The Crows are also likely to appeal with a final call to be made on Tuesday morning.

Blues midfielder Adam Cerra was nabbed for a tackle on Sydney’s Tom Hickey where the Swans ruckman’s head bounced off the turf.

Swans veteran Luke Parker is defending a tackle which saw him pin the arms of Sam Walsh before dumping him to the ground.

Fremantle midfielder Jaeger O’Meara was also caught in the crackdown after a heavy tackle on Melbourne’s Charlie Spargo.
Click to expand...
I'm sorry, but Laird did NOT drive Lachie Neale's head into the ground. What rubbish.
 
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