AFL Match Review Panel

The AFL Tribunal is the disciplinary tribunal of the Australian Football League (an Australian rules football competition).

Source: AFL Tribunal 2011 Guidebook Prior to 2005, any player who was reported would face a hearing at the AFL Tribunal. This process had become problematic, and in 2005, a new system (similar to that used by the NRL Judiciary at the time) was adopted. The changes were primarily made to reduce the number of tribunal hearings, and to improve the consistency of penalties.

The current tribunal process is as follows:

On-field umpires and certain off-field observers can report players for incidents which occur during games. On the Monday after the round of football, each incident is then reviewed by the Match Review Panel, a small panel of former players and umpires. Within the review, the Match Review Panel grades the severity of the incident in three factors, and awards activation points depending upon the severity. The three factors are:

The activation points from all three categories are added together to give the total activation points for the incident. It is important to note that an incident involving accidental/incidental conduct, or negligible impact, will be rejected and the player will receive no penalty, even if the activation points in the other categories are high. Because of this, any offence must rate at least three activation points to be considered further.

Next, activation points are converted into an offence level:

Next, the player is given a number of base demerit points, based on the type and level of his offence. The base demerit point totals are standardised in the Table of Offences. As an example, any player charged by the Match Review Panel with a Level 4 Kicking offence receives 550 base demerit points. This is where the Match Review Panel's role in the Tribunal process ends.

Following the Match Review Panel's findings, a player's base points are subjected to a series of additions and deductions (which are described in the next section) to arrive at a number of total demerit points. Each 100 total demerit points that a player finishes with then corresponds to a suspension for one match; e.g. a player who finished with 225 demerit points will receive a two-match suspension. If a player finishes with fewer than 100 demerit points, he is not suspended, but receives what is known as a reprimand.

Because the penalty is standardised and pre-announced by the Match Review Panel, the player has the option to plead guilty to the charge and receive his penalty without the need to attend a Tribunal hearing; he receives a deduction for doing this (see next section). Alternatively, a player may choose to appeal the findings of the Match Review Panel, and attend a Tribunal hearing to argue the case. Players may appeal to try to have their entire charge withdrawn, or may argue for a reduction in one of the three factors; e.g. a player could try to have the conduct factor reduced from reckless to negligent. Should a player successfully reduce the severity of his infraction, the penalty is re-evaluated and the player is again given the choice to plead guilty or further contest the revised charge.

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