By Michael Esposito
THE Western Region Football League has backed its tribunal’s decision to hand out hefty punishments for incidents in recent junior matches.
Three weeks ago, the coach of Wyndhamvale’s under-10 White side was suspended for the rest of the year for disputing the umpire’s decision and using insulting language towards the umpire.
In the same week, a Werribee Centrals under-16 C player was rubbed out for 18 matches for attempting to kick an opponent. A week later, an under-16 B player from the same club was suspended for 10 matches the week for threatening behaviour towards an umpire.
WRFL operations manager David Newton said the 18-match ban stood because the offender did not attend the tribunal hearing and was therefore found guilty in the first instance.
“The 18 premiership matches is probably a result of the significance of the charge but also the fact that the player decided not to attend, therefore they’ve probably given him a bit more,” he said.
“These incidents unfortunately do occur in all forms of sport. It’s how we deal with them that’s the important thing. As you can see by the suspensions, the tribunal is dealing with them quite seriously.”
WRFL CEO Bob Tregear said the Wyndhamvale coach’s punishment was tough because it happened at a junior game and within earshot of children aged 9-10.
“The under-9 and under-10 coaches, they’re very privileged people, they’re allowed to be out there on the ground, running around with the kids when they play, they’ve got a special responsibility there to handle themselves well and set a good example,” Tregear said.
“This particular coach at Wyndhamvale, I think he’s a pretty good coach but he got frustrated on the day, said things he shouldn’t have said and the example is he won’t be coaching for the rest of this year.
“He’s devastated about it, as well as being embarrassed he understands he done the wrong thing in front of the kids who look up to him. He’ll learn from that and come back even better for the experience I guess.”
Tregear said the WRFL’s record of player misdemeanours was similar to most suburban leagues, and pointed out that no charges were laid on the 4-5 June weekend.
“We’re running over 160 games ever weekend across Saturday and Sunday so to get nothing at all coming out of that is a very good result.
“There are pockets of different culture within our leagues and at some clubs you get more incidents than others.”
