Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\nThe alleged incident occurred on Saturday night, before relevant interviews took place and submissions made on Monday. <\/p>\n
The league is thought to be hunting a five-match ban for Rankine \u2014 which would end his season \u2014 with the Crows now in the process of readying their response. <\/p>\n
Respected commentator and AFL 360 host Gerard Whateley called the drawn-out process \u201cconvoluted\u201d on Wednesday night, with the saga about to enter its fourth day. <\/p>\n
\u201cThat is an intolerably convoluted process, and it risks the AFL looking indecisive \u2014 perhaps behind the scenes they haven\u2019t been at all, but that\u2019s how it looks from the outside,\u201d Whateley began on Fox Footy. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt does make me wonder why Andrew Dillon and his legal team didn\u2019t go to Adelaide on Tuesday, sit in the board room and stay until matters were resolved. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think on a public front … this is going to run all the way until game day of Round 24 \u2014 it\u2019s a nasty story. It\u2019s got an unsavoury edge, and some of the debate around it is it\u2019s damaging to the code.\u201d<\/p>\n
Whateley expressed his belief that the Crows aren\u2019t acting \u201cin a contrite manner\u201d as they continue to try for the most lenient possible suspension. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy focus, really, is on Adelaide, who seem desperate to fight every angle of this,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not a picture of accepting responsibility and acting in a contrite manner. And they are arguing the toss at every turn, formally and informally \u2014 (making the argument) finals games should be worth more than home-and-away games, even though there\u2019s no precedent in the system for that. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey have gone with Rankine was provoked, which is a big stretch, I think \u2014 he was antagonised, but provoked is a big stretch. <\/p>\n
\u201cInformally, they\u2019ve even raised Snoop Dogg. That\u2019s the domain of talkback radio, not a responsible footy club.\u201d<\/p>\n
McRae: ‘No room for homophobic slurs’ | 02:03<\/p>\n
Whateley said there were \u201cthree possibilities\u201d that could have eventuated. <\/p>\n
\u201cFront up to what happened, pledge to address whatever it is in the environment that allowed this to happen, and accept what\u2019s coming,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Former Demons captain Garry Lyon took a slightly different route to Whateley, suggesting the Crows were within their rights to \u201cfight and fight hard\u201d to get Rankine off the hook \u2014 provided they also fall on their sword and accept the forthcoming penalty when the time comes. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s incumbent from a supporter\u2019s point of view to do the best job they possibly can to see if they can get Izak back playing,\u201d Lyon said on AFL 360. <\/p>\n
\u201cNow, as unsavoury as that may sound, and as you\u2019ve pointed it out, it smacks of them not wanting to take responsibility, I think they are entitled to argue their case as vociferously and as strongly as they possibly can, given the stakes that are at play \u2014 so long as they are accepting of the final verdict and it doesn\u2019t go too far. <\/p>\n
\u201cAs a football club that\u2019s sitting on top of the ladder and are premiership favourites, there is a way to deal with it. And as I said, I don\u2019t begrudge them the right to fight and fight hard \u2014 even if that means getting in the trenches a bit \u2014 but there comes a time where you do need to show some humility and be accepting of the penalty, and that\u2019ll come.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Adelaide Crows have come under scrutiny for \u201carguing the toss at every turn\u201d with regards to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":82951,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[9126,638,62648,12259,64,63,689,55,639,62652,10133,62654,10143,62653,25551,41672,1119,20924,10145,61,2105,3245,12413,3231,62651,12412,62657,673,677,62649,38381,62646,62647,62650,49334,85,670,7200,62656,62655],"class_list":["post-82950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-adelaide-crows","tag-afl","tag-alleged-homophobic-slur","tag-andrew-dillon","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australia-and-new-zealand","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-board-room","tag-collingwood-magpies","tag-contrite-manner","tag-craig-mcrae","tag-final-verdict","tag-finals-games","tag-five-match-ban","tag-football-club","tag-game-day","tag-garry-lyon","tag-gerard-whateley","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-home-and-away-games","tag-homophobic-slur","tag-jack-jovanovski","tag-lenient-possible-suspension","tag-matt-king","tag-means-getting","tag-new-south-wales","tag-oceania","tag-ongoing-investigation","tag-premiership-favourites","tag-responsible-footy-club","tag-sides-loss","tag-slur-saga","tag-snoop-dogg","tag-sports","tag-sydney","tag-sydney-swans","tag-talkback-radio","tag-weeks-controversy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82950","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=82950"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82950\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82951"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}