Big penalties for sub rule breaches

AFL operations boss Steve Hocking is confident there’s “safeguards” in place to ensure clubs don’t exploit the new medical substitute rule.

A day before the season-opening clash between Richmond and Carlton, the AFL announced that a 23rd player would be available for clubs in the event of a game-ending injury or concussion.

Hocking said the AFL would demand medical records if they suspect clubs have exploited the rule during, with stripping points or draft picks a possibility for any transgressions.

“There’s quite clearly some safeguards that’s we’ve put in place around (clubs not breaking the rules),” he said on Sportsday.

“A player (being substituted for concussion) is a 12-day mandatory period out of the game and with (a non-concussion injury sub), when a doctor is applying decision making around an injury there’s still thinking about whether they’ve sustained a game-ending injury and whether they’ll miss next week.

“There’s always examples where players will recover differently to other players and we have a safeguard in place in terms of the chief medical officer (to look at that) and then if required, there’s scans and further information that can be demanded by our chief medical officer.

“The other safeguard is (a) conduct unbecoming (penalty) and if that happened in a grand final, we would be analysing that very quickly.

“There’s a range of things that are in place under that conduct unbecoming (charge) which is everything from points (penalty), to fines and even (stripping) of draft picks.

“That’s the capture all and from our point of view, that’s safeguarding against (exploiting) the rule.”

– BY LAURENCE ROSEN/ SEN