2 days ago
Coaches both say same thing after Geelong player's hit sends opponent to hospital
Chris Scott and Damien Hardwick have both agreed that Tom Stewart's hit on Noah Anderson was a fair bump, and the Geelong Cats player doesn't deserve a suspension. Stewart flattened Noah Anderson in Geelong's win over Gold Coast on Saturday night, and Anderson was later sent to hospital as a precaution.
Play was held up while Anderson was assessed by medical staff, before he jogged slowly off the ground. He was eventually taken to the Suns' change-rooms, and later went to hospital for scans on his chest region.
The Suns captain was cleared of concussion after his head hit the turf after the collision, which saw Stewart bump his opponent body-to-body. Some have suggested Stewart might draw a suspension because he ran past the ball to hit Anderson, but Scott and Hardwick don't think so.
Cats coach Scott insisted Stewart showed the appropriate duty of care to Anderson and was adamant there would have to be a fundamental shift in rules for the five-time All-Australian to face sanction. "If it's a protective action where contact's unavoidable and you don't get them in the head, then you've done everything you can," Scott said in his press conference.
"I sort of feel for Noah. Everyone loves him, he's a gun player and it was pretty heavy contact to the ribs, but it was to the body. Stewy, I thought his duty of care to Noah was as good as it could have been, and he was good enough to hit him in the body."
Suns coach Hardwick agreed there was nothing untoward in the bump from Stewart, who was given a four-match ban in 2022 for a nasty hit on Richmond player Dion Prestia. "The game's combative, accidents happen on the footy field. It's one of those things," Hardwick said.
"We'd love Noah to keep playing (but it's) within the rules, still allowed to bump. It was a reasonable hit, a solid hit. He's a big boy, Tom Stewart. But once again, we'll make it very clear, it was chest. It wasn't head or anything like that - no concussion. From our point of view he'll just go there (hospital) and see what that comes back at."
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Speaking on Fox Footy after the match, reporter Jay Clark said he doesn't think Stewart has anything to worry about. 'He'll be fine,' Clark said. 'This is one of the bumps of the season. We should be celebrating this sort of physicality in our game.
'He executes the perfect bump, he doesn't hit him in the head there, Tom Stewart. We hope Noah Anderson is OK, but the MRO (match review officer) and the AFL will look at this tomorrow, and they'll ask 'Is it unreasonable? Is it excessive?' And it's clearly not. So, Tom Stewart will be playing against Essendon next week, in my view.
"It's got to be unreasonable or excessive in the first instance. It's still got to be a reportable act; it's got to be rough conduct. And in my view, that was a clean bump to the shoulder. That's the sort of bump that we still want in our game, I think.'
