Mark Duffield: Fining Brisbane forward Eric Hipwood for pushing opponent into an umpire sends unclear message

Commentary great Dennis Cometti might have called the AFL’s tribunal decision to fine Eric Hipwood $2500 for the push that saw his opponent flatten an umpire the third of two options. Nathan Buckley summed up the Hipwood incident from Thursday night’s Brisbane-Bulldogs clash pretty well. Two possibilities: Hipwood intended to push Gardner into umpire Jacob Mollison, or could have foreseen that his push would cannon Gardner into Mollison making this a very serious offence in the realm of the umpire shove offence that saw Toby Greene get six weeks last year. Or Hipwood could not have foreseen that his push on Gardner would result in the umpire being flattened and therefore this was all an unfortunate accident with no case to answer. The verdict and the punishment for Hipwood however sits somewhere uncomfortably in the middle – that Hipwood was in a position to anticipate Gardner might be pushed into the umpire but it was still only worth a fine. That sends a strange message to the public at a time when we are wanting umpires to be treated with more respect: As long as the contact is deemed careless and not intentional it’s minor. Surely there is no such thing as minor contact with an umpire unless it is a total accident. To be clear, I have no great problem with Hipwood being free to play this weekend. The behind the goals footage shows that Gardner initiates contact with him and tries to block his run. After watching the replay several times I couldn’t be totally comfortable that his actions were anything other than instinctive - to push the player illegally blocking him off the ball. So it could be argued this was just an unfortunate accident. But it could also be argued that once a measure of culpability was found against Hipwood as it was at this tribunal, the punishment, and the message sent had, to be more than a fine.