Do we need 4 of them?
I thought the standard of umpiring was shocking at times last year but I haven't noticed them at all so far this year.
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Push for fourth umpire
By Caroline Wilson
The Age
April 5, 2005
The AFL could move to a four-umpire system as early as next season, having already trialled an extra field umpire in a recent Richmond-Brisbane Lions practice game.
Jeff Gieschen, the league's director of umpiring, last night confirmed he had recommended further trials take place over next year's pre-season competition and did not rule out the prospect of four field umpires officiating in every AFL game next year.
"That ultimately is up to the commission," Gieschen told The Age. "Every week, we hear that we missed a free kick here or made a wrong decision there and at the moment we are operating with an accuracy rate of 85 per cent.
"If we found an extra umpire lifted that rate to 90 or even 95 per cent, then it's worth pursuing, although clearly there is a cost factor to consider.
"The game has changed so much and become faster and it is demanding a greater level of fitness. It would also extend the careers of experienced umpires.
"You saw the flooding and congestion that took place in some games over the weekend. You have a situation where you have 30 playing around a throw-in and then you need to protect yourself with an umpire at each of the 50-metre lines. An extra set of eyes would be handy."
The move is also being pushed by senior AFL umpires, who agree that an extra umpire would increase decision-making accuracy, relieve the increasing physical pressure on umpires and act as an extra deterrent to illegal tactics.
"It's something I've been looking at for two or three years," Gieschen revealed. "It came to a head with the new rucking interpretations, where you are seeing the two end-zone umpires dragged to the centre square and that leaves us a little vulnerable.
"When you consider that basketball with a 30-metre court uses three umpires and Federer versus Agassi in a game of tennis play in front of something like 12 umpires, you have to wonder that Aussie Rules is played on an oval 180 metres long and 150 metres wide . . . we just think that to keep abreast with all the changes going on in the game it makes sense."
Gieschen, along with assistant umpires' coach Peter Howe, observed the first experiment at the Richmond-Brisbane practice game on March 12 at Optus Oval. Senior Victorian umpires Darren Goldspink, Hayden Kennedy, Stephen McBurney and South Australian Justin Schmitt officiated at the game, which was not captured on film.
"The feedback from all four umpires was very positive," Gieschen said. "It was a hot day as I recall, about 29 degrees, and under those circumstances normally, the three that finished would have ended the match fatigued and stressed. They found that physically it made their job a little easier; it helped to have an umpire on both sides of the stoppages; when the ball was kicked, there was an umpire with the kicker and another where the ball was being directed.
"And their (umpires') stronger presence on the ground acted as a better deterrent to illegal tactics. We want players going for the ball and not the man."
Gieschen's report from last month's experimental practice match, which he admitted was deliberately kept under wraps at the time, was delivered to the AFL's football operations chief Adrian Anderson 10 days ago.
Gieschen said to introduce four umpires on a full-time basis would first require a recommendation from Anderson.
"We already have four umpires at every game, it's just that the fourth at present is an emergency umpire," he said.
"When you think about it, we've gone from one, to two, to three umpires in a relatively short space of time. This is the 12th season since the third umpire was introduced and the ball moves around a lot quicker than it did in 1993."
http://www.realfooty.theage.com.au/realfooty/articles/2005/04/04/1112489421085.html?from=storyrhs
