Controversial former AFL umpire Michael Pell has labelled Jordan Clark a “spoilt brat” after the Fremantle youngster was penalised for dissent late in the Dockers’ Gather Round defeat to Carlton on Saturday – a decision backed in by the AFL.
Fremantle was ahead in the dying stages before Matthew Cottrell was awarded a mark despite the ball clearing being touched by defender James Aish.
23-year-old Clark and a host of his teammates protested furiously to the umpires as Cottrell kicked the goal, before the umpires gave Carlton a free kick right in front for Clark’s ongoing complaints.
Matthew Kennedy kicked the goal as Carlton pulled off a remarkable 73 points to 63 win, their first ever at Adelaide Oval.
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Carlton scrape through with controversy | 03:10
Pell, a former AFL umpire who resigned in late 2022 after being arrested on conspiracy of supplying inside information to others around Brownlow Medal votes, took aim at Clark.
“The irony in all this is that I warned Jordan Clark in a Covid 14v14 nothing game when he was a spoilt brat and carrying on that he needed to stop abusing umpires,” Pell wrote on X.
“Guess he still hasn’t learnt. Stinky attitude and any wonder Geelong were happy to see the back of him.”
Pell has not been charged over the Brownlow Medal betting scandal.
Speaking on the Channel 9 on Sunday morning, AFL CEO Andrew Dillon said the dissent decision was the “right call”, but wasn’t willing to reveal what Clark said to the umpire.
“Given the time of day and we’re on TV, I can’t repeat what was said. But the dissent was there,” he said.
Dillon however did acknowledge that there was an error made by missing the touched ball by Aish that led to the Cottrell goal.
“(The mark to Cottrell) wasn’t there in the first place. We missed that, you only see it back though on slow-mo replay, so it’s a tough game to umpire,” he added.
“We’ve acknowledged the mistake there, but the dissent decision was correct.”
Fremantle coach Justin Longmuir said his team needed to ‘get on with it’ given umpires never reverse decisions made on the field.
“The players clearly thought they had touched the footy and they’re still saying that now,” Longmuir said post-match.
“We just need to move on because the umpires are never gonna backtrack, are they? … we should have just got on with it, even if they weren’t happy with the call before.
“There’s not much you can do … But that’s a really hard call for the umpire to make without going to a replay and we don’t want to do that for every decision.”
“…we played a good game of footy” | 06:48
Meanwhile, Hawthorn legend Jason Dunstall said on Fox Footy: “They lost their cool. They lost their cool when they thought the ball was touched off the boot and the umpire didn’t pay it.
“The one thing you’ve got to do is keep your cool and they lost it.”
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