RECAP: Fremantle Dockers successfully challenge captain Alex Pearce’s three-match rough conduct ban
Fremantle captain Alex Pearce’s three-match ban has been overturned at the AFL Tribunal on Tuesday.
Pearce was offered a suspension for rough conduct following a collision that left Port Adelaide’s Darcy Byrne-Jones concussed during Saturday night’s clash at Optus Stadium.
The incident was graded careless conduct, severe impact and high contact, resulting in a sanction of three matches.
However, the AFl Tribunal have ruled in Pearce’s favour, dismissing the charges.
The Dockers will face Gold Coast before the bye, then North Melbourne and Essendon over the next month.
Recap proceedings in our blog.
Example
Fremantle have shown an incident with Tom Lynch from 2023 where he was in a similar situation and got off becuase he moved his body and arms to protect the player.
However, the chair Jeff Gleeson says he is “not inclined” to allow the footage becuase it is too different from the current incident.
He did accept that there were good points in the comparison that don’t need the comparison to be made.
Pearce’s intentions
Mr Hammond for Fremantle says;
Both players were trying to get ball.
Both players were going to the space at pace.
Both players had both fully and equally committed to the contest.
He also says Pearce not leaving his line shows he is at all times trying to get the ball and believes he will.
In super slo-mo Pearce is shown to have raised his left arm into a position to set himself for a mark before spotting Byrne-Jones and lowering it again.
Mr Hammond argues softening the arm is a good indicator he keeps his eyes on the ball until it’s just too late.
He also says it shows his intent to do least harm by leaving himself open to damage.
The incident
Just in case you need a reminder of what they are discussing.
AFL submissions
Ms Flynn has laid out the AFL’s points.
1. Breached duty of care and engaged in rough conduct because his conduct was unreasonable.
2. It was reasonable to foresee going for the mark would result in a reportable offence.
“The AFL argues it was inevitable player Pearce was going to be second to that contest.”
The AFL are argueing Pearce’s intentions for the contest “don’t matter” becuase he was always going to be second.
AFL’s turn
Ms Flynn starts by showing the incident from start to finish in slow motion and step-by-individual-step.
Pearce accepts he approached with a lot of momentum and explains he didn’t pull up and allow Byrne-Jones to take an open mark becuase his job is to impact the ball and he thought he could mark it.
He also didn’t accept his duty of care is to Byrne-Jones in a marking contest, rather to his job as a player.
Eyes on the ball
Pearce believes he did not leave the line of the footy and it was a marking contest.
He also added he didn’t realise he had hit him high at the time of the incident.
Pearce revealed he has watched the replays multiple times and says he does not believe he would change what he did as a leader and defender at the club.
Closing the space
Pearce says ahead of Port winning the ball he realised Byrne-Jones could come back into free space at the top of 50-metre arc.
As the Power won the footy he realised he needed to close that before mentioned space so set off.
The kick then came high so he says he went to mark the ball on the chest as he did earlier in the match.
Pearce then revealed he realised “at the last moment” Byrne-Jones was there so he dropped his arm and “braced”.
He said he realised he could hurt Byrne-Jones if he raised his arms up so that is why he dropped his arms and took the contact on the body.
Pearce speaking
Alex Pearce is taking questions from his lawyer as part of the evidence process.
So far they are explaining his role and how it is played during wet conditions such as the heavy rain on Saturday night.
A video of Pearce taking a chest mark earlier in the night has been played to describe how he makes decisions between chest marks and hands out.
Dockers challenge
The Dockers council say they will be challenging that the contact against Byrne-Jones was careless and will argue the skipper did everything that is reasonable to protect his opponent.
They will not challenge the high contact.
Hopeful
The Dockers say they are hopeful of getting Pearce cleared tonight.
Longmuir said he believes accidents can’t be removed from the AFL.
