Cut Cats stirs AFL to order covers to signs

PERTH’S new Optus Stadium must place protective covering around its LED signage on the perimeter fence after incidents that left two Geelong players requiring stitches on Sunday.

The AFL announced the change would be required after reviewing the circumstances around cuts suffered by Geelong’s Mark Blicavs and Zach Tuohy, who were left bloodied after running into the fence, with Blicavs requiring 14 stitches in his hand and elbow.

Geelong coach Chris Scott was clearly biting his tongue when he discussed the issue on Monday night’s edition of Fox Footy’s AFL 360. “It’s not ideal,” Scott said. “Either that’s freakish, to have that happen to two players in 15 minutes and it’s never going to happen again, or there’s a bit of a problem that needs to be addressed.”

The AFL said yesterday: “AFL general manager football operations Steven Hocking said that while the run-off area at Optus Stadium had been set at 5.5m, beyond AFL guidelines that request a minimum distance of 5m, it was the AFL’s immediate priority to ensure that any risk of injury to players was reduced and this would require action around the signage.

“(Hocking) said the covering of the current signage would be used as a temporary measure until a permanent solution would be installed by the venue in the latter part of the season.

“Mr Hocking said the AFL thanked the venue and its senior management for their willingness to address the issue as quickly as possible in the aftermath of last weekend’s match.

“At this time, no additional safety measures are required at other AFL venues, pending further follow-up.

“Optus Stadium chief executive officer Mike McKenna reiterated that player safety was the primary focus and the venue would continue to work closely with the AFL to make these signage infrastructure updates as quickly as possible.”