There will be one story you cannot avoid coming out of a hard and sometimes spiteful game between the Saints and Kangaroos at RSEA Park.
If you haven’t seen it, I am adding it, below.
Late in the second quarter, North co-captain, Jy Simpkin pumped the ball inside 50 after collecting on the boundary. After he disposed of the footy, Jimmy Webster hit him like a freight train, leaving Simpkin flat out on the Moorabbin turf. It was a crude hit that made the Sam Powell-Pepper incident a week prior look like a primary school kid’s picnic. Simpkin’s head snapped back upon impact, and he looked out before he hit the turf.
Webster will be looking at a lengthy suspension for this hit – my guess is somewhere in the 6-7 weeks vicinity.
Last week, the Powell-Pepper hit was one of those cases where the AFL wanted a guilty verdict and you knew it a mile off. However, it was an incident that had the mitigating factor of Mark Keane being swung into Powell-Pepper upon impact by Willie Rioli. This was disregarded by the league, and it would not have surprised me if Port were informed that to oppose the AFL’s preferred outcome on this one would have been “unwise”. If you doubt the way that place is run, please read Michael Warner’s ‘The Boys Club’ and get back to me.
This week, there is no mitigating factor. There was no doubt about this hit. It was intentional, it was late, it was high, and the impact was severe.
Unlike the SPP incident, there will be no defence from me for the player. Unlike many, I reckon there was a chance that the hit on Keane was an accident. This one on Simpkin was no accident.
He deserves what he gets.
Anyway, there was also a game of footy that took place – did you know that? And despite a scare, as the Roos mounted a spirited comeback in the second half, the Saints managed to take a 19-point win in blustery conditions.
Let’s jump into the remainder of the action.
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