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<\/p>\nWest Coast Eagles midfielder Jack Graham has broken his silence since being handed a four match ban, declaring homophobic language needs to be eliminated from the game.<\/p>\n
Graham is the fourth AFL-listed player to receive a ban for using \u201ca highly offensive\u201d slur against an opponent, following an incident during West Coast\u2019s round 17 clash against GWS.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Barely a week after Graham\u2019s suspension, Sydney\u2019s Riak Andrew was suspended for five matches after using a homophobic slur in a VFL match against North Melbourne.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Last year, Gold Coast\u2019s Will Powell and Port Adelaide\u2019s Jeremy Finlayson served suspensions for using homophobic slurs in AFL matches, while St Kilda Lance Collard was banned for using a slur in a VFL match.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Speaking to\u00a0SportFM, Graham, who is two matches into his suspension; has taken responsibility and stated he, and the AFL community needs to do better.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happened in the GWS game, we need to stamp that out of our game. That\u2019s why I went straight to the club and admitted what I\u2019d done,\u201d he told\u00a0SportFM.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI apologised to the GWS player and the wider community.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a tough couple of weeks for myself and my family. But at the same time, the club and the fans have really supported me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a challenging time, but one that I\u2019ve got to learn from and do a bit better at, and so does everyone in the AFL and the wider community.\u201d<\/p>\n
Graham self-reported the incident to the club following the match, who then informed the AFL Integrity Unit one week later.<\/p>\n
There was no report from a player or umpire regarding the incident.<\/p>\n
The AFL also stated the penalty was less severe as Graham self-reported the incident.<\/p>\n
Graham says was able to get on the front foot post match and apologies to the player and GWS coach Adam Kingsley.<\/p>\n
\u201cStraight after the game, I went and apologised and we went from there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were a couple of phone calls between the player and the GWS coach Adam Kingsley.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was my midfield coach and had him for four or five years at Richmond. We\u2019ve got a really good relationship and even him admitting saying that was out of character.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut still what I said wasn\u2019t good enough but we were able to make up and straight away get on the front foot.\u201d<\/p>\n
Graham returned to training this week after being given time off following his suspension by the Eagles and spending time with family in South Australia.\u00a0<\/p>\n
IMAGE: AFL Photos<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"West Coast Eagles midfielder Jack Graham has broken his silence since being handed a four match ban, declaring…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":18749,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-18748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18748"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18748\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}