{"id":607987,"date":"2026-04-15T07:29:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T07:29:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/607987\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T07:29:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T07:29:13","slug":"deeply-disappointed-aflpa-chief-slams-tribunal-for-butters-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/607987\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Deeply disappointed’ AFLPA chief slams tribunal for Butters decision"},"content":{"rendered":"

Port Adelaide are preparing to appeal Zak Butters’ fine for umpire abuse, believing the star midfielder has been branded a liar by the AFL<\/a> Tribunal verdict.<\/p>\n

As the AFL Players’ Association expresses deep concern at the tribunal not believing Butters’ testimony, Port chairman David Koch is “pretty certain” the club will appeal.<\/p>\n

“He’s incredibly angry with the outcome. He quite rightly believes he’s been dubbed a liar in all this,” Koch told Adelaide radio station 5AA on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

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Butters, charged with using abusive and insulting language towards an umpire, was fined $1500 by the tribunal on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The tribunal distributed its written judgment just after 2.30pm AEST on Wednesday, almost 24 hours after Butters’ hearing began.<\/p>\n

The tribunal sided with field umpire Nick Foot, who alleged Butters said “How much are they paying you?” after he awarded a free kick to St Kilda in Port’s 14-point loss on Sunday night.<\/p>\n

Butters vehemently denied that comment, insisting he said: “Surely that’s not a free kick.”<\/p>\n

AFLPA chief executive James Gallagher said the organisation was “deeply disappointed” by the tribunal outcome.<\/p>\n

James Gallagher is the AFLPA CEO.\u00a0James Wiltshire\/AFL Photos via Getty Images<\/p>\n

“A misunderstanding about what was said on field should have been resolved in the aftermath of the match, not referred to the tribunal,” Gallagher said in a statement.<\/p>\n

“The tribunal determining not to accept all of the evidence consistent with Zak’s version of events …nor have sufficient doubt when upholding a charge is deeply concerning.”<\/p>\n

Complicating the matter was the entire verbal exchange was not picked up by umpire Foot’s microphone — though some comments before and after were.<\/p>\n

“There are many possible reasons for that, including the positioning of players to the microphone,” the tribunal said in its written judgment.<\/p>\n

The tribunal was “satisfied to the requisite standard” that Butters made the offending comment.<\/p>\n

“It is implausible that Mr Foot would invent the offending comment and it was not put to him that he had done so,” the judgment said.<\/p>\n

“It was put to him that there were several distractions and that he had misheard what Mr Butters said. We also consider that to be implausible.”<\/p>\n

The flashpoint came when Foot paid a free kick to St Kilda’s Mitch Owens, prompting Port’s Ollie Wines and Butters to protest.<\/p>\n

Butters was penalised 50m and reported for abusive language by Foot.<\/p>\n

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“The comment that Butters made to me was ‘How much are they paying you?'” Foot told the tribunal.<\/p>\n

Foot interpreted “they” as being “the St Kilda Football Club or someone involved with St Kilda”.<\/p>\n

“It questioned my integrity,” he said.<\/p>\n

“I’m 100% adamant that those are the words Zak Butters said to me.”<\/p>\n

But Butters said he was “100% sure” he did not say “how much are they paying you” to Foot.<\/p>\n

“I recall saying ‘surely that’s not a free kick’,” Butters told the tribunal.<\/p>\n

AFL Umpires Association chief executive Rob Kerr defended Foot.<\/p>\n

“Nick Foot has never wavered from his account,” Kerr said in a statement.<\/p>\n

“His response to what he perceived was said was entirely consistent with the expectations placed on umpires charged with protecting the game’s integrity.<\/p>\n

“And he has behaved appropriately through each step of this process at the cost of significant personal discomfort, particularly with some of the online vitriol.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Port Adelaide are preparing to appeal Zak Butters’ fine for umpire abuse, believing the star midfielder has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":607988,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-607987","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-australian-football-league","12":"tag-australianfootballleague","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607987","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=607987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/607988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=607987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=607987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=607987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}