Burns defends Bombers against points deduction

TIWI Bombers president Mick Burns says suggestions his side must lose premiership points for playing an unregistered player in matches against Palmerston and Darwin are wide of the mark.

Burns said the Bombers had done nothing wrong in the Mark Parmbuk registration saga despite his orig- inal club Darwin claiming he is still their player.

The Bombers assumed Parmbuk was their player for the 2013- 14 season after obtaining a season’s permit from the league’s operations department.

‘‘ From a Tiwi Bombers perspective all we can do is put up our case which is what we did in this instance,’’ Burns said.

‘‘We asked for clarification on the status of the player and based on that advice we played him (Parmbuk) with the full support of the AFLNT.

‘‘If there is any fault with this it’s certainly not a fault of the Tiwi Bombers.

‘‘I question why they ask, or suggest, we lose our points when we’ve simply done what we’re required to do and we’ve done that in a complete manner.’’

Burns and the Tiwis are more interested in giving Wadeye-born Parmbuk an opportunity to play football with the club of his choice.

‘‘I thinks that’s one of the key things in this,’’ he said. ‘‘The lad wants to play with the Tiwi Bombers and we’ll do everything we can to make sure that happens.

‘‘The most important thing . . . is the lad is playing footy and fingers crossed it will continue to be with us.’’