Based on the fact that Hodge is a “good bloke” and couldn’t avoid the collision, so why not do a sudden upward movement and take Heppell out, not a lot of time to plan, sure, but there was a definite upward movement that resulted in Heppell receiving head contact and being knocked out.
In fact I’ve just looked at it frame by frame, and while Heppell flew towards Hodge with the intention of naively laying a tackle, Hodge very quickly summed up the situation and deliberately laid Heppell out, didn’t miss a beat and went on to contest the ball with Heppell unconscious behind him.
I don’t know whether to be outraged or admire how quickly he took the Jake Melksham to Jarrod Roughead approach to an imminent collision, except at a fraction of the threat to his own wellbeing and 10 times the speed and efficiency to the point people barely noticed.
Here is the frame by frame breakdown:
Okay, here he choses to stop gathering the ball, eyes off the ball and now lining up Heppell, to avoid being tackled with the ball by Hepp who is obviously slowing down to reduce the impact while Hodge is winding up to increase it.
Heppell trying to stop and tackle Hodge, while Hodge is actively running through Heppell using the full force of his legs and as we will see his body and arms as well, where Hepp is trying to give him a hug.
Incredibly, all of Hodges motions happen with the ball barely beginning its descent to the ground. You have to give Hodge credit for a very quick deliberate technique, unfortunately this good bloke got no credit for all his skill and speed in dispensing with Heppell from the MRO Christian.
This fkn AFL. Fk you, mockery of the sport i once loved. At the point where if my son doesnt want to play or really give a ■■■■ then im not worried. He can obviously never support another team, but Gil is on a record run of idiot decisions whilst at he helm.
Has anyone seen any of the footage before Hooker threw the “punch” ? Was there any element of retribution for an earlier incident by Mackenzie?
The way I saw it, MacKenzie was on top of the ball, Hooker might have been trying to punch the ball out from under him, but I cannot know, and neither can the MRO know what Hookers intention was.
It is allowed to punch the ball isn’t it ?
IMO its not 100% certain that Hooker was trying to hit him in the head and missed like the MRO says. Hooker was doing a round arm over the guys shoulder ending up under his body, missing MacKenzies head and body entirely,
In future, I dont think its now possible to speculatively try to punch a ball out from under a player. Its likely to be seen to be a poorly directed punch to the body/head.
We do have a problem. If you can be fined for a punch that misses both ball and head, when you are going for the ball near a players head, just about every defender is going to be fined every week.
Hooker had his head over the ball and the stkilda guy come flying in and put Hookers neck in danger. I can’t recall anything earlier beside the Saad injury that warranted Hooker to lash out.
My biased opinion and history of watching Hooker is that he wanted to intimidate and at the same time get the ball free as hooker got the free and wanted to move it fast. The stkilda guy must have known he gave the free but tried to slow the game down and continued to contest the ball.
Hooker had every right to do what he did and executed exactly what he chose to do.
