{"id":633780,"date":"2026-04-27T09:27:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T09:27:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/633780\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T09:27:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T09:27:15","slug":"afl-concedes-error-on-controversial-arc-call-as-league-boss-says-umpiring-as-good-as-its-been-for-a-long-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/633780\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL concedes error on controversial ARC call as league boss says umpiring ‘as good as it’s been for a long time’"},"content":{"rendered":"

AFL football boss Greg Swann says clubs believe the state of umpiring “has been as good as it’s been for a long time” despite conceding errors involving the league’s review system, ARC, were made during a pair of matches on Sunday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Swann spoke on Monday amid rising tension following a pair of calls which impacted the St Kilda-West Coast game at Docklands Stadium and the GWS-North Melbourne game at Manuka Oval.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The first incident occurred when play was halted over a minute after St Kilda ruckman Rowan Marshall took a mark on the goal line, causing major confusion to fans, players and pundits covering the game.<\/p>\n

While the correct decision was made by the ARC, Swann conceded the decision “just took way too long”, and said the ARC would no longer have the ability to stop play to assess a previous incident once play has continued. If a goal umpire does not call for a review in the moment, there will be no future opportunity to do so.<\/p>\n

“The ARC will still do goal reviews \u2026 but they won\u2019t intervene in a score like they did on the weekend, unless the goal umpire asks for a score review,” Swann said.<\/p>\n

“There’s a balance between getting it right and affecting the fabric, or the flow, of the game.<\/p>\n

“We brought rules in at the start of the year to make it easier to umpire and to keep the game moving, and we felt that example yesterday took way too long \u2014 frustrated the fans, probably frustrated those watching.”<\/p>\n

\"Griffin<\/p>\n

Swann conceded the ARC made an error in allowing a GWS goal despite replays appearing to show North defender Griffin Logue touching the ball with his hand. (Fox Footy)<\/p>\n

Swann also admitted an error had been made where GWS forward Xavier O’Halloran was awarded a goal despite replays during the review process appearing to show North Melbourne defender Griffin Logue clearly touching the ball.<\/p>\n

ABC Sport Daily podcast<\/a><\/p>\n

ABC Sport Daily is your daily sports conversation. We dive into the biggest story of the day and get you up to speed with everything else that’s making headlines.<\/p>\n

“In this case, [the ARC officials] both felt that there wasn’t sufficient evidence to turn that over, so they went back and said that was an ‘umpire’s call’,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We’ve had another review of that today \u2014 you can see that it was touched, so that one was incorrect.”<\/p>\n

Despite the pair of controversial moments involving the ARC in Round 7, Swann said “most of the feedback” from clubs had been positive surrounding the league’s officiating so far this season.<\/p>\n

“I think the change in the way the game is played has helped that,” he said.<\/p>\n

“You have the last touch [rule], so you don’t need repeat boundary throw-ins. You have the ability for the ball to keep moving, which means there isn’t as much congestion, because the umpires do get blindsided when there’s a scrum around and they’re trying to see who’s got the ball and who hasn’t.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AFL football boss Greg Swann says clubs believe the state of umpiring “has been as good as it’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":633781,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,307019,69114,60685,64,63,55,639,6278,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-633780","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-afl-review-centre","10":"tag-afl-umpires","11":"tag-arc","12":"tag-au","13":"tag-australia","14":"tag-australian-football-league","15":"tag-australianfootballleague","16":"tag-greg-swann","17":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633780","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=633780"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633780\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/633781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=633780"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=633780"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=633780"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}