CATS TO FIGHT TOMMY BAN
Cats call in top lawyers in bid to free Tom
GEELONG’S chances of freeing Tom Hawkins for Friday night’s preliminary final with Richmond will rest on its ability to convince the AFL tribunal the key forward’s contact on West Coast defender Will Schofield was careless rather than intentional.
The Cats will engage a highpowered team of legal minds, likely to be led by Ben Ihle, to build a case to present to the panel tonight, which will ultimately need to determine where the incident sits on the AFL’s table for grading classifiable offences.
Ihle has been used by Hawkins and the club previously.
Critical to the defence will be behind-the-goals vision, which is understood to show crucial details of the moments that led to the incident.
The previously unseen vision should provide strength to the argument the alleged strike happened while the two players were in play, but from there the panel will still need to be persuaded the incident was not intentional.
The Cats will enter the hearing knowing how vital the outcome is but with no added risk of Hawkins being given an extra week for challenging they were always likely to appeal the match review officer’s finding.
However, rather than seeing this as a free roll of the dice, they firmly believe there is sufficient evidence to overturn the initial finding that has ruled him out for the Tigers clash.
Schofield was penalised early in the game for impeding Hawkins, resulting in a Geelong goal, and the duo’s subsequent battle was full of the typical pushing and shoving, and holding of jumpers seen between forwards and defenders.
Only seconds before the incident took place, Schofield had grabbed Hawkins by the arm near the 50m line as the pair was running toward the Geelong goal.
With the Cats in possession of the ball, Hawkins was trying to gain separation between himself and his opponent at the time and broadcast vision shows Schofield’s body lower right before the Geelong veteran tried to free himself of the West Coast backman’s grasp.
It will be one of two tribunal hearings tonight after GWS forward Toby Greene was cited for unreasonable contact to the eye region of Brisbane Lions ball magnet Lachie Neale.
Both players are seemingly irreplaceable but the Cats will wait until after tonight’s hearing before looking at how to potentially overcome taking on Richmond without their main target in attack.
Geelong was successful at the tribunal earlier this year, with Gary Ablett’s one-game ban for striking Dylan Shiel downgraded to a $2000 fine in May.