A Victorian country pub has launched a spirited defence of Richmond players caught up in a Mad Monday storm, declaring the controversy has been “blown out of proportion” and accusing waiting media of hoping to catch the Tigers making a mistake.

But the timing of the footage has raised a more uncomfortable question, with what might ordinarily be dismissed as Mad Monday horseplay appearing to make light of a deeply serious situation unfolding elsewhere in the AFL.

Tigers players were filmed at The Garfield Hotel, about 80km east of Melbourne, where the team had booked out the venue for its end-of-season celebrations.

Footage captured by news outlets on Monday showed one player feigning shock after being spanked on the rear by a teammate, while an additional clip showed a player whipping another across the back with a belt.

The footage prompted scrutiny amid suggestions the antics appeared to reference the scandal engulfing Sydney, where a police investigation into allegations of sexual assault is underway.

There is no suggestion of criminal wrongdoing by any Richmond player, and the circumstances surrounding the Tigers footage are markedly different from the serious allegations surrounding the Sydney Swans being investigated by Victoria Police.

But the controversy comes at an exceptionally sensitive time for the AFL.

Sydney players Isaac Heeney, Chad Warner, Nick Blakey, Riley Bice and James Jordon have been suspended for the remainder of the season for breaching club standards following events at a Melbourne hotel.

Victoria Police is separately investigating a report of sexual assault. No charges have been laid, and The Nightly is making no suggestion the five suspended players have committed any criminal wrongdoing.

However, the timing has placed behaviour that might otherwise have been written off as end-of-season antics under an intense spotlight, particularly amid concerns that turning the Swans sexual assault allegations into a joke risks distracting from the women who have made a report to police.

The Garfield Hotel has now hit back at the controversy and thrown its support behind the Richmond players.

“In our view, this has been blown out of proportion,” the hotel said in a statement posted to social media.

The pub said it “could not speak more highly” of the players and their behaviour throughout the afternoon.

“For such a young group, they were extremely respectful and a fun group of boys to deal with,” the statement read.

“They enjoyed a few quiet beers to unwind after a long season, and we see nothing wrong with that.

“They had booked out the venue for the afternoon, so they were the only patrons on site.

“They enjoyed their afternoon and moved on.”

The hotel also turned its attention to the media gathered outside the venue, claiming reporters had been waiting for the players “in the hope of capturing a misstep, which we consider disappointing”.

The Richmond footage emerged just hours after AFL chief executive Andrew Dillon publicly addressed the Sydney saga for the first time and warned against allowing the focus on footballers to overshadow the women at the centre of the police investigation.

“While there are players involved, we cannot lose sight of the bigger picture. More importantly, there are women who have made a report to police and they should be shown care and respect,” Dillon said.

His comments put the Richmond footage into particularly stark contrast.

“I have been asked a lot in recent days, what message football should be sending young people and what we should be saying to our kids,” Dillon said.

“For me, the answer is straightforward: it doesn’t matter who you are, it doesn’t matter what you do, whether you’re an AFL footballer - the way we treat women says a lot about who we are as people, as a community and as a game.

“Quite simply, respect for women is not negotiable.”

The issue is therefore bigger than whether Richmond players were entitled to let their hair down after a long season.

The hotel has argued the players were respectful, the venue was closed to other patrons, and the media was waiting for a mistake.

But criticism of the footage centres on something different: whether apparently turning one of the most serious issues confronting the AFL into material for Mad Monday antics risks trivialising the allegations and shifting attention away from the potential victims.