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After six years of tertiary education and numerous part-time positions within sport and recreation, Daniel secured an ideal full time role within local government in November 2010.
Away from work, Daniel has 18 years of cricket experience under his belt and has coached and served on committees at numerous clubs. He also plays baseball in winter and is again a member of the club committee.
Sport and recreation is an obvious interest for Daniel and his articles reflect that, especially his knowledge of cricket and football.
The owner, manager and editor in chief of Pen & Paper Sports, Daniel hopes to see the site grow from strength to strength in the future.
Three players from Echuca United Football Club have this week been suspended for a total of 244 weeks, after a melee broke out during their under 17s Grand Final against Congupna. The fight broke out late in the last quarter when Congupna were leading Echuca United 109 to 21.
Congupna coach, Bruce Fuller, described the incident which left Shepparton teenager Jack Brophy's jaw broken in three places as, "Pretty disgusting and something you don’t want to see happen on a footy field.” He went on to describe the incident as;
"A bit of a melee broke out between about 10 or a dozen players and one of our young guys went in to pull one of our guys out of the contest. He did that and the umpire told him to get out, so he backed off. Then a kid runs in from probably 20m away and king-hit him from behind. The force of the blow knocked his mouthguard probably 10m out of his mouth. It just came out of nowhere really and just escalated. It turned out ugly in the end. It was a blight on the game. It was a really disappointing end to a good game. A lot of people were in shock I can tell you!”
The 16-year-old who allegedly hit Jack was suspended for 200 weeks, whilst a second Echuca United player received 32 weeks in total, 16 weeks for kicking and 8 weeks each for two striking charges. A third Echuca United player received 12 weeks in total for two charges of striking (6 weeks each). Three players suffered concussion in the brawl, two of who were knocked unconscious, with one taken to hospital.
This all comes just two weeks after Blackburn player Jeffrey Ryan was suspended for 6 weeks, after a late strike to the side of Balwyn player Shaun Bergin’s head. The strike, and resulting impact of landing, left Bergin in a coma for 2 weeks before his family decided to turn off life support last weekend.
Incidents like this occur from time to time, sadly it's a part of the game. However quite often the punishment doesn’t fit the crime, be it too lenient or to strong.
It’s interesting to see how different tribunals react to respective incidents. Some choose large punishments (ie: a 200 game suspension) in order to make a strong statement and stamp this type of behaviour out of the game, whilst others choose to go through a detailed process, analysing the incident and handing down what they believe is the appropriate punishment. It’s also important to factor in the potential backlash from media outlets when a suspension is given after events like these.
What are your thoughts on this? Is a 200 game suspension too strong? Or was Ryan’s 6 week suspension to lenient? Further to this, what should tribunals look for when deciding adequate punishments? The incident itself or the resulting injuries to the player? I’m interested in hearing your thoughts so please share them below.
DJC
