Field umpire, Justin Schmitt was back for his first AFL match since tearing a calf in round 3. Justin umpired the GWS v Richmond game. Troy Pannell was still suffering from the knock he received over a week ago and was struggling to train last week.
Rob O’Gorman has had a very different start to his AFL umpiring career. The three matches he has umpired has had a scoring differential of 345 points between the competing teams.
(Hawks by 145 over the Saints; Eagles by 111 points over GWS and the Roos by 87 points over the Lions). Let’s hope that his next one is a little closer.
While our field umpires have struggled all season with injuries that have kept them off the park our boundary umpires have stayed pretty much injury free. They have all certainly been available for selection until Dillon Tee was injured at training last week and Chris Gordon suffered a bad bleed that put him into hospital. Chris is a haemophiliac and has to attack his rehabilitation and injury treatments very differently to the other guys.
Long time AFL umpires trainer, property steward and AFLUA life member, Frank Knight got his first opportunity to go back to training tonight last night (Monday 27 May) to say farewell to the umpires and training colleagues since his retirement in November last year. Frank has not been in the best of health but certainly was looking forward to renewing acquaintances last night. Frank was involved with our umpires for 18 years. We have no better supporter than Frank and indeed his colleagues who work so diligently behind the scenes to prepare our umpires to be the best they can possibly be.