North Melbourne will be without Jarrad Waite on Sunday after he accepted a one match ban for engaging in rough conduct.
Kangaroos’ GM Football Cameron Joyce said the club looked at all avenues to challenge the Match Review Panel’s sanction but was unable to identify an appropriate course of action.
“With all these types of cases involving our players, we scrutinise them very thoroughly. The last thing we want is to be without Jarrad for a week, let alone two given the quality player his is and the profound impact he has on games,” Joyce told NMFC.com.au.
“Based on the classification of the charge and after taking legal advice, we were unable to find any likely grounds to successfully contest it despite the fact we were keen to do so.”
Waite's tackle on Adelaide’s Tom Lynch in the first quarter of Saturday's clash at Blundstone Arena was called play on but the MRP viewed it much differently than the umpire upon review.
“We considered our options for some time yesterday, last night and again this morning, but deemed the risk of losing Jarrad for an extra week was too significant.”
Saint Koby Stevens was charged with a similar offence after a ‘dangerous tackle’ on GWS player Nathan Wilson that was also graded as careless conduct with medium impact to the head which drew criticism from Geelong coach Chris Scott on Fox Footy’s AFL360 program.
"Clearly, the umpires and the MRP are seeing things differently at the moment," Scott said on Monday night.
"That one [the Waite tackle] is a player on one leg completely off balance. It wouldn't take much effort at all to bring him down to the ground.
"We're asking too much of the players on this one, especially when the umpire is with a really good view looking at it and saying, 'That's play on', and then the outcome two days later is a two-week suspension, albeit down to one.
"I'm not sure that we're quite on the same page with this one and I'd hate to think that the fact that the players are concussed is playing into the outcome.
"I'm firstly acknowledging how difficult it is and that we do have a responsibility to look after the players but … in my humble opinion, those decisions aren't right."
From the coach’s box St Kilda’s Alan Richardson thought Stevens had laid a "great tackle".
"That's where it becomes challenging because on the day you get the right call, or the call that works for you, and then later on it's called reckless," Richardson said on AFL360.
"It's very likely that we'll wear it.
"Our advice is that, at this stage, that we're probably not going to be able to reverse the decision. We just can't risk the two (weeks)."
