Heal wants points off

Flames coach says WNBL should dock Caps

SYDNEY Uni Flames coach Shane Heal has lashed out at the light sentence handed to the Canberra Capitals for using private training vision to gain an unfair advantage, declaring: “You can’t cheat and keep your points.”

Heal’s push for justice comes as Basketball Australia will appeal an independent panel’s decision not to dock the Capitals WNBL competition points for sharing confidential Flames training video for scouting purposes.

Referee Simon Cosier and Capitals coach Paul Goriss were both suspended for engaging in prohibited conduct after a Basketball Australia investigation found that the pair misused inside information and “engaged in conduct that would impair public confidence in the integrity of basketball”.

Cosier, who was suspended for the rest of the season, supplied Goriss, a two-time WNBL championship winning coach, with confidential video clips of the Flames training scrimmage that had been used for referee education purposes.

Goriss was suspended from all coaching until January 20 for behaviour was labelled “unprofessional and extremely disappointing” by BA chairman John Carey.

Despite the guilty finding, an independent panel found no actual advantage was obtained by Goriss or his team when the Capitals beat the Flames in the opening round.

Heal strongly disagrees with the panel’s findings, revealing Canberra received private video of actual warm-up games, including three clashes between the Flames and the Capitals, and not just training vision as previously stated.

He believes this clearly gave Canberra an unfair advantage to beat the Flames in the opening round and he wants to see the Capitals docked points for “cheating”.

“We ran a full-court press for most of the game and they got the vision of what we were doing to prepare for,” Heal said. “We ran that play 27 times in the first game, so to say there was no advantage is simply not right.”

Sydney had employed three WNBL officials to referee five warm-up games for prepTHE aration purposes. Heal revealed he initially refused to allow the WNBL referee’s boss to film the warm-up games as he wanted it to remain private.

However, the referee’s boss pushed for filming to go ahead for educational purposes.

The Flames agreed, but the club never thought the game vision would used for a team to gain an unfair advantage during the season.

“We spent weeks preparing for what they were just handed, that they had no right to get. If this was AFL or Rugby League it‘d be front page.”