WINES SHOWDOWN BAN

Interview over front fence proves costly

OLLIE Wines last night joined Essendon defender Brandon Zerk-Thatcher on the sidelines for the return to football weekend after they breached COVID-19 protocols by allowing people to visit their houses.

News Corp first reported yesterday that Bombers defender Zerk-Thatcher was suspended for one game after self-reporting that a friend had been at his home and will miss the match against Sydney at the SCG on Sunday.

Having realised his error he stood in front of the playing group to explain the circumstances and apologise.

Port Adelaide vice-captain Wines was last night handed a suspension from the Showdown against Adelaide tomorrow night and will be forced to watch from home.

He conducted an interview with Channel 7 on his front veranda and while it was socially distanced, it was a clear breach of AFL rules.

Players must conduct interviews either over the internet or at the club, and Wines’ breach will be viewed poorly given he was conducting a paid interview as part of a commercial deal with Seven and not a media arrangement connected to a club request.

He spoke to the AFL’s integrity team yesterday and after missing training will need a negative COVID-19 test to return to the club.

Port Adelaide has a captain’s run at 9.30am today and was hopeful it would have his test results back by then.

Now he will have to work his way back into the side.

The league has a set table of penalties it can use to assess transgressions for COVID breaches after they were ticked off by the AFL Commission.

Port Adelaide football boss Chris Davies said the interview was a clear transgression.

“Ollie conducted an interview yesterday which was done at the front of his house, which the AFL have obviously spoken to us about overnight,” Davies said.

“They’ll want to talk to Ollie at some point during the day.

“Ollie needs to own the fact that it happened and whatever happens from here will obviously happen.

“The protocol is that you shouldn’t be inviting people to your home who don’t live at your home through this period.

“Despite the fact that the media organisation didn’t go into his house, they did interview him at the front of his house and that’s a breach.”

Zerk-Thatcher was one of the finds of the pre-season for Essendon.

He had 12 possessions in the Round 1 win over Fremantle.

Before this year, the 195cm defender had played a single game after being taken at pick 66 in the 2018 national draft.