More pain for May
GOLD Coast Suns cocaptain Stephen May could miss Sunday’s clash with Melbourne at the MCG after being offered a one-week suspension for striking.
The Suns defender was cited for striking Carlton’s Ed Curnow in the final quarter of Saturday night’s 35-point loss at Metricon Stadium, with AFL match review officer Michael Christian grading the incident as careless contact, with medium impact to the head.
Should he accept the sanction, the 26-year-old tall will miss the Suns’ battle with the sixth-placed Demons.
Carlton young gun Patrick Cripps remains eligible for the Brownlow Medal, but Curnow has also been slapped with a ban.
Christian yesterday cleared Cripps of any wrongdoing in a tackle that concussed Gold Coast’s David Swallow, while Curnow can accept a one-game suspension for striking May.
“The first thing to note here is that whilst Patrick Cripps wraps his right arm around David Swallow, his left arm is actually trying to contest the ball,” Christian said. “So his arms weren’t pinned.
“Then the question was ‘Did he drive Swallow into the ground with excessive force?’ We didn’t believe that was the case.
“He got to the side of Swallow, both players actually got hands down to try and break their fall, it was just an unfortunate accident.
”We didn’t believe the tackle by Cripps was of a dangerous nature.”
The young Blue is the second player in betting markets for the Brownlow Medal behind hot favourite Tom Mitchell of Hawthorn.
Adelaide’s Kyle Cheney was the only other player offered a suspension yesterday. Four others can accept fines.