News

I might sound like a broken record at times, but the football world should stop momentarily and salute an umpiring champion who equaled a record this week and should break the record in round 16.  Hayden Kennedy retired at the conclusion of the 2011 season with 495 AFL games including 39 finals and 5 grand finals in the bank.  Hayden, at the time decided that he couldn’t continue for another season because in his words, “I am done.”  Hayden umpired his first AFL game in 1988 and hung up the whistle 23 year later in what was a truely remarkable and stellar career.  We walked away at the time wondering who would ever get near the record, don’t worry about breaking it!  On Sunday, Shane McInerney walked onto Marvel Stadium for the St Kilda v Richmond match following a five week layoff with injury and a game in the VFL, to equal that amazing record.  Just for the record Shane umpired his first senior AFL match in 1994 and some 24 years later, is on the precipice of breaking Hayden’s remarkable record. Shane has umpired 495 games including 26 finals and 2 grand finals.  We await this weekend……….

Another senior field umpire has succumbed to injury.  Serious questions now need to be asked about the four into three field umpire trial over the bye rounds and the potential future of the system.  The system was designed to have four appointed umpires interchange during games to reduce workload and look to using those more senior umpires in two matches over a weekend. The three senior umpires all sustained injuries in matches and couldn’t complete the match.  The latest, Shaun Ryan came off the back of two games the previous week and has appeared to sustain stress fractures in his foot.  He was forced out of Friday nights clash between Sydney and Hawthorn at half time.

Congratulations to field umpire, Ray Chamberlain, who umpired his 300th game last Friday night at Marvel Stadium when Essendon took on Hawthorn.  Ray’s transition onto the AFL list was a little out of the ordinary.  He wasn’t trialled through the normal pre-season system, rather he was appointed to the list in mid 2004 as the best performing State league Umpire when another contracted AFL umpire walked away from his contract mid season.  It didn’t take fans and the media to look at this little fella running around an AFL ground and want to know more about him.  Ray wasn’t one of your run of the mill umpires, Brian Taylor made sure Ray wasn’t forgotten and nailed a nickname to him, that stuck.  No other umpire since Darren Goldspink has had a nick name stick.  So “Razor Ray” was born.  It was probably opportune that Goldy was part of the Razor send up on The Front Bar on channel 7 prior to Ray’s 300th.  Ray will never die wondering but he is one of the most accurate decision makers going around.  Love him or hate him he is undeniably resilient, having missed many matches with serious leg injuries.  He is also one of the best and has been for more than a decade now.  Ray’s game statistics, 300 AFL matches including 23 finals and 2 grand finals has stood the test of time.  Ray has also sat on the bench as the emergency in another 3 grand finals.  Well done Ray.  Ray becomes the 27th field umpire in the history of the VFL/AFL to umpire 300 AFL matches.

You could be excused for thinking that at the start of the bye rounds, with only 6 games on, that footy might just slip from front of mind as some teams take a well earned rest.  Waking up on Tuesday morning that couldn’t be further from the truth.