Sydney will appeal the AFL tribunal’s decision to uphold Isaac Heeney’s striking suspension as debate rages around Brownlow Medal eligibility criteria.

Heeney was unsuccessful in overturning his one-match ban for striking St Kilda’s Jimmy Webster during a lengthy tribunal hearing on Tuesday night. It’s expected the hearing at the Appeals Board will be held on Thursday night.

As it stands, the 28-year-old will miss the ladder-leading Swans’ clash with North Melbourne on Saturday and is out of the running for the competition’s highest individual honour.

But a successful appeal would mean Heeney is reinstated as one of the Brownlow favourites.

Essendon coach Brad Scott said Heeney’s ban was for an “innocuous incident”.

“There’s always been an element of fairest in the Brownlow. You can win your club best and fairest when you’re suspended but you can’t win the Brownlow,” he said on Wednesday.

“But the game has changed significantly where players are in incredibly difficult positions at times and for the right reasons — we protect the head, we protect all these things.

“But for somewhat of an innocuous incident in the scheme of things to rule someone out from Brownlow eligibility I think is harsh and needs to be looked at or at least discussed.

“Because we’re talking about careless acts that are 0.001-of-a-second decisions, I mean, then they’re not intentional, they’re not, in the old vernacular, ‘dirty acts’.

Melbourne coach Simon Goodwin agreed.

“With all the things that we evolve in our game (like) the protection of the head, there’s always flow-on effects,” Goodwin said.

“This is potentially one of those flow-on effects where it’s a little bit easier to get reported these days and get suspended.

“So are these things that we need to look at in the game, especially around eligibility for a Brownlow Medal?”

Carlton captain Patrick Cripps, who won the Brownlow two years ago, on Tuesday declared he wanted a review of eligibility criteria.

“You’d hate to see someone like Isaac, if he did win, miss out on the chance.

“He’s had a great year and he’s a great player, and I feel like he plays the game the right way,” said Cripps, who won the 2022 medal after a late-season suspension for a high bump was overturned.

Sydney have several options to consider in their grounds for appeal in the Heeney case.

Under AFL rules, the Swans could argue there was an error of law during the tribunal hearing, that the decision was unreasonable, or that the classification of the offence or sanction imposed were manifestly excessive.