Source :- PERTH NOW NEWS
Hawthorn midfielder Conor Nash has been handed a four-week suspension with the AFL Tribunal taking a dim view over his hit which knocked out Geelong’s Gryan Miers.
Nash collected Miers’ head with his right forearm in the third quarter of the blockbuster East Monday clash at the MCG.
Miers was assisted from the ground and immediately subbed off by the Cats with concussion, with Nash sent straight to the tribunal with the incident assessed as careless conduct, severe impact and high contact.
In a bid to lessen Nash’s sentence, Hawthorn lawyer Myles Tehan tried to argue his hit on Miers was less severe than Fremantle’s Patrick Voss’ hit on Nick Vlastuin, which cost the forward three weeks.
“This was not a dirty act. It was an obvious football act attempting to impact the play by tapping the ball away (which went wrong),“ he said.
“We say the Voss incident was more careless and this, and about the same or slightly less severe than this. If that got three weeks, this should be three weeks.“
However, the ploy failed, with Nash was suspended for four weeks, meaning he will miss games against West Coast, Richmond, Melbourne and Gold Coast.
The AFL argued Nash deserved a bigger penalty due to the high level of carelessness shown.
“There was no prospect of gaining possession or really spoiling the ball in any way,” AFL barrister Andrew Woods said.
“We have some difficulty in understanding how Nash got it so wrong here,” the AFL said in its sentencing.
“We find the degree of carelessness here was significant.
“We accept that he was not intending to strike Miers to the head. He should have known that his forceful swing of an arm at head height may well result in just such a strike.”
It will create more headaches for Sam Mitchell, who was already without Will Day (foot), leaving his midfield stocks thin.
Nash argued he only had eyes for the ball but expressed his regret over the incident.
“I saw a player, didn’t know who it was, coming through to grab the footy and I simply try to tap the ball, knock it free with my arm,” he told the tribunal.
“I just want to express with deep regret what happened to Gryan. I’m very remorseful for the incident. I was simply trying to make a play on the ball and I just got it badly wrong.”
