Demons great Garry Lyon has slammed Greg Swann’s claim that Richmond’s Ben Miller was rightly penalised 50 metres for not standing the mark last Friday.

It comes as Melbourne’s coach on Monday night lamented the “inconsistency” of holding-the-ball adjudications, with overall umpiring performance firmly under the microscope.

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In the Tigers’ Anzac Eve loss to Melbourne, Miller, running side-by-side with Demons skipper Max Gawn, was pinged for not stopping to stand Brody Mihocek’s mark — judged to be within five metres of the Dees forward’s grab.

Despite the brutal harshness of the call, given Miller’s split-second decision to keep tracking the ever-potent Gawn, Swann confirmed on Monday afternoon that the right call was made by the umpire.

“The goal here is for him to stand the mark,” Swann told media outside AFL House.

But on Fox Footy’s AFL 360, Lyon was extremely critical of that call.

“No, rubbish. Well, OK, if they’ve said that that’s right, then all of a sudden, umpires are becoming coaches,” Lyon said.

“In every world, Ben Miller’s going and tracking the most dangerous big man in the game; he deserves the right to stay with the big man.

“If you’re running hard through that area with an opponent, you can’t stop him … god help me, man. Swanny, don’t tell us that’s right — that’s crap.”

Lyon said the idea that Miller had to let Gawn, still considered the best ruckman in the competition, let him run free and man the mark instead, was ludicrous.

“That is bull-dust. That is total crap,” he continued.

“And if you reckon that’s the way it should go — and I’ve been a supporter of the ‘stand’ rule — then throw it out. Throw it out.”

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Swann had offered George Wardlaw’s screeching-to-a-halt to man the mark against the Giants as the example for Miller to follow in that situation.

“Oh, come on, man,” Lyon said in reaction.

Co-host Gerard Whateley added: “I don’t think that’s like-for-like, personally, but that’s what was used (to compare).”

It came on a night where the Tigers were hard-done-by from an umpiring perspective, with the holding-the-ball interpretation a particular sore point.

“I did feel for them — I ran into Tommy Lynch as I was walking out of the ground … he just sort of shrugged his shoulders to say ‘we’re trying our best, here’,” Lyon said.

“I was one of those nights. The result doesn’t change … but by hell, they got a rough ride (with the umpires).”

AFL 360 showed a host of examples where either effective Richmond tackles weren’t rewarded, or when Tigers players were penalised on the other end of the stick.

Asked about how ‘holding-the-ball’ has looked this season, Melbourne coach Steven King told AFL 360 on Monday night it’d “been inconsistent”.

“I think we probably got the rub of the green on Friday night, when you look back at it, but I’ve had other games where I’ve felt like it’s just the inconsistencies at times,” he said on Fox Footy.

“The speed and the ferocity with which the players are tackling — it can be frustrating at times — but I do understand the umpires have a very hard job to do as well.”

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Probed on which part of the rule needs most attention, King said: “I think prior, how long the players have to break tackles.

“We all coach our players to try and be strong and drive tackles, and then if it’s not paid straight away, how long (until) it then becomes a dangerous act where players can risk injury? I think that’s the fine line with it all.

“We rate tackling, and broken tackles are an asterisk next to a player’s name, so they’re going to try and tackle with real intent, and I’d love to see it rewarded consistently.”

Earlier on Monday, Swann said the feedback from clubland had been that the state of umpiring was a big positive.

“It’s really clear, there’s plenty of vision we sent to the clubs at the start of the year (on) how it was all going to be adjudicated,” Swann said.

“It’s probably the toughest rule in the book … (but) I would have thought, if you take away the ARC issues, most of the feedback we’ve had from clubs is that the umpiring has been as good as it’s been for a long time.

“I think the change in the way the game’s being played has helped that … I think it’s still working, but it’s a tough rule, the holding the ball rule.”