SA Footy

Late last year I was forced to write of my admiration for umpire Tony Dey. There had been widespead criticism by West supporters that he appeared to give Westies less than a fair go. I wrote:

"I think it's time to have some understanding for the tough job the umpires have and today we saw a perfect example.

Poor umpire Tony Dey. No doubt out to impress and then saddled with the worst run of luck an umpire could have. No matter how hard he tried to be the officiating umpire when the free should obviously been awarded to West Adelaide, it just never seemed to happen. It was lucky for the other 2 umpires that they weren't saddled with the same problem, but for poor Tony, no matter how hard he looked for a West free, in all conscience he just couldn't find one. Now, the meaner observers could perhaps have thought that several of the line-ball decisions might well have gone Westies' way, but you have to give credit to Tony - he stuck to his principles and wouldn't be swayed and that sort of courage is what we want to see in an umpire and I, for one, applaud it. As a West supporter I was disappointed to have a few celebrations for goals cut short by Tony's courageous decisions, but you had to bow to his steadfastness.

I marvelled at the numerous 25 and 50 metre penalties he handed out and admired his ability to differentiate between seemingly similar contests to penalise West when all and sundry thought they might be rewarded.

What a relief I felt for him when he found an inside 50 free for the Bloods when the game was all but over.

My admiration is even higher when I consider that his performance at Westies games is always the same.

So thank you, Tony, for adding so much to my day. My team wasn't good enough on the day, but at least there was something to celebrate."



Now, even in Round 1, I find myself again having to defend Tony. In today's paper, Warren Partland, a journalist for whom I have the highest admiration (and a good bloke), mentions Tony twice:

"The Bloods had closed the deficit to just 11 points before umpire Tony Dey made a disgraceful shepherding call against Bloods skipper Ryan Ferguson on the goal line"

and

"But another Warren goal from a Dey free kick midway through the term proved decisive".

Now, before I defend Tony, it should be made clear that West lost because they kicked points instead of goals, but I was incensed by the above comments. Didn't Warren realise that Tony had again seen something that nobody else had the vision and courage to see? The fact that it was once again against West was just part of an unfortunate pattern and I applaud his bravery in sticking to his principles. His ability to see and penalise the most innocuous transgressions must be admired and I look forwad to him extending this to the opposition at some time, but I admire that he's perfecting these calls against my team first.

Tony, you are my hero and have my full support

My sarcasm detector just overloaded.

R&B I was with you all the way brother until you started quoting Warren Partland, given his disgraceful comments vis-a-vis the umpiring, in particular Coin Rowston, following teh 2007 Elimination Final that he has: zero, nix, negligible absolutely no friggin idea about umpiring.

He proved in his particular comment piece following that Final that he had no idea about umpiring and the how teams first to the football get rewarded. So to cite him as supporting evidence for your concerns about umpiring seriously weakens your argument.

Well, that would actually strengthen my argument, am Bays

I have to say, however, that despite one old article you bear a grudge about, I find Warren Partland's reporting to be very good.

I listened to him on RPH the other night and he showed more courage on the matter of Norwood's recent troubles than any other commentator (along with Chris Kendall).

Unfortunately, he was mistaken in his judgement of a couple of crucial calls made by Tony yesterday

redandblack wrote:I have to say, however, that despite one old article you bear a grudge about, I find Warren Partland's reporting to be very good.

Agreed he is generally very good, by far the reporting of the SANFL (Partland, Millbank and Capel) is far of far greater standard than that of the AFl Rucci and Flejsted.

Only two aspects of Partland writing I do not like - his criticism of umpiring (lack of knowledge of the laws and the intent of the laws) and how he downplays Centrals perforamces if iw asn't paranoid I would think he he down plays Centrals performances to create the "no one rates us so we'll show 'em" mentality out at Elizabeth.

Always gives Port a rough deal, I presume because he and his family are life long Port supporters and its his way to be impartial.

While i would be the last one to defend umpires I dont believe they were critical in the result yesterday. While West had much more posession they were indirect and indecisive. SOUTH had a focal point in Warren who booted 7 goals and were far more direct -giving him one out opportunities against his opponent.
Wests kicking for goal,particularly from set shots was something akin to an u/10's game.The wind was not a factor yesterday either.

The umpiring standard was a hell of a lot better than the playing standard, I assume we'll have thread for each single player too?

blueandwhite wrote:While i would be the last one to defend umpires I dont believe they were critical in the result yesterday. While West had much more posession they were indirect and indecisive. SOUTH had a focal point in Warren who booted 7 goals and were far more direct -giving him one out opportunities against his opponent.
Wests kicking for goal,particularly from set shots was something akin to an u/10's game.The wind was not a factor yesterday either.

I agree with you, B&W, West lost the game because of their poor kicking for goal, not because of the umpiring. I was just vigorously defending Tony Dey, that's all.

redandblack wrote:Now, even in Round 1, I find myself again having to defend Tony. In today's paper, Warren Partland, a journalist for whom I have the highest admiration (and a good bloke), mentions Tony twice:

"The Bloods had closed the deficit to just 11 points before umpire Tony Dey made a disgraceful shepherding call against Bloods skipper Ryan Ferguson on the goal line"

and

"But another Warren goal from a Dey free kick midway through the term proved decisive".

I was providing score updates for this match and I made comment at the time about two very puzzling free kicks to Ben Warren, both of them mentioned above.

Although I think the Panthers deserved to win because they used the ball better, I feel Westies fans have every right to feel annoyed by both decisions. To be frank, on both occasions the umpire got it wrong.

The shepherding call was simply Ferguson trying to make front position in a marking contest. In no way was Warren restricted in his ability to contest for the football.

The second one was even worse. Bailey was trapped against the boundary line, hadn't really taken possession of the ball and it spilt loose as he was flung to ground in a tackle. The whistle went and I was expecting it to be a free to Bailey for holding, but it went to the tackler Warren. Very strange decisions, both of them.

I'd go so far as to say the game was quite poorly umpired, but I didn't pay any attention as to which umpire was making the poor decisions.

Only two aspects of Partland writing I do not like - his criticism of umpiring (lack of knowledge of the laws and the intent of the laws) and how he downplays Centrals perforamces if iw asn't paranoid I would think he he down plays Centrals performances to create the "no one rates us so we'll show 'em" mentality out at Elizabeth.[/quote]

Let it be known that Warren is a Centrals supporter.

He wrote the Dogs off after they lost to Glenelg at Elizabeth last year only to remind all Glenelg supporters after the Grand Final how week they were and good the Dogs are.

Tony Dey has to be the worst umpire in the SANFL,he pays far too many 25m penalties and is just too inconsistent with his decisions.Rowston is next but I think he is a Bay fan isnt he.

Seriously when Westies start focusing on things they can control they might improve

Sorry Dutchy, I made it very clear that had nothing to do with West losing.

My apologies for an obviously poor attempt at a light-hearted post

Love your work R&B

redandblack wrote:Sorry Dutchy, I made it very clear that had nothing to do with West losing.

My apologies for an obviously poor attempt at a light-hearted post

It was so good, it almost looked like you were genuine in thanking him on a good performance.

redandblack wrote:.....
Now, even in Round 1, I find myself again having to defend Tony. In today's paper, Warren Partland, a journalist for whom I have the highest admiration (and a good bloke), mentions Tony twice:

"The Bloods had closed the deficit to just 11 points before umpire Tony Dey made a disgraceful shepherding call against Bloods skipper Ryan Ferguson on the goal line"

and

"But another Warren goal from a Dey free kick midway through the term proved decisive".

Our forwards scored goals. Theirs didn't.
Our backs worked like trojans. Theirs didn't.

The crap about two dodgy free kicks to Dugga, evaporates if you look at the Teev coverage. The commentators took about 2 seconds to agree the ump got the shepherding right when they looked at the replay. And the one at the other end, the West player dropped the ball, it wasn't knocked out by the tackle. So once again a correct decision. Although even Dugga was bemused by it.

On the other hand we had two free kicks in our attacking 50. Which is our quota till August allready spent.

Spiritof64 wrote:On the other hand we had two free kicks in our attacking 50. Which is our quota till August allready spent.

So that's why you haven't been winning flags all these years.