Crows coach Brenton Sanderson admits Taylor Walker's spear tackle could have been dangerous Mark Stevens
From: Herald Sun
July 04, 2012 ADELAIDE coach Brenton Sanderson conceded Taylor Walker's controversial spear tackle on Richmond's Steven Morris could have been dangerous.
After Saturday's match, Sanderson described the tackle as "fantastic".
"Later, once we'd seen the replays, it was pretty clear it could have been dangerous," Sanderson said.
"When I was asked about Taylor's tackle straight after the game, I had only seen it live. He had won a free kick and a shot on goal and Morris jumped straight up."
Significantly, Sanderson stopped short of pointing the finger at Walker, who will miss the next three matches after the Crows accepted a ban offered by the match review panel.
"I'm not going to criticise Taylor. We want him and all our players to be aggressive," Sanderson said. "But we will continue to work on tackling technique."
A medical report provided by Richmond played a key role in the panel determining the impact suffered by Morris was "medium".
Morris had neck soreness, but yesterday said he appreciated Walker approaching him after the game and checking on his welfare.
"Life goes on," Morris said.
There is no suggestion the Tigers spiced up the medical report, but they were not in the mood to do the Crows any favours either after the events of late last season.
Football clubs have long memories and bad blood remains after the Crows were seen to have "dobbed" on Jake King after Round 23 last year.
King copped a two-match ban for a sling tackle on Andy Otten after slipping through the match review panel net.
The panel looked at the incident only after the Crows alerted them to it after the panel findings were released on the Monday.
Adelaide was forced to release a statement as the furore broke.
"The incident was mentioned in a discussion with an AFL official ... but it was certainly not our intention for any investigation to occur," Crows football operations manager Phil Harper said.
"In fact, we thought it was too late for that."
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