Above: A controversial umpiring decision cost the Clayton Magpies a spot in the grand final and angry supporters let the men in orange know all about it. The chaos forced police and security guards to escort the officials from Springvale Reserve. By Glen Atwell
THE Clayton Magpies were ‘seeing orange’ after a controversial 50-metre umpiring decision seconds before the final siren forced their early exit from the Southern Football League (SFL) Division One finals.
The Magpies suffered a devastating one-point loss to the East Brighton Vampires in their preliminary final at Springvale Reserve on Saturday.
A game-breaking decision from the men in orange cemented the Vampires’ win, but the Magpies had dug their own graves on the scoreboard.
After trailing the Vampires all day, the Magpies had 22 chances in front of goal, but were booting more points than the goal umpires could wave their flags at.
In two finals matches the Magpies have kicked 16 goals and 38 points, a conversion rate unlikely to win a premiership and a weakness the Vampires exploited to progress to the grand final this weekend.
The blustery conditions did not help the struggling Magpie forwards, who at three-quarter time had kicked a lowly two goals, 12 points.
The contrast of accuracy was evident, as the Vampires booted seven goals and just three points in the same windy conditions and despite having eight scoring shots less than the Magpies on the day, always looked a winning side.
A 21-point Vampire lead at three-quarter time looked like a winning margin for East Brighton.
But miraculously the Magpie forwards, namely Greg Polson, found the sweet spot on the boot and had the goal-umpires raising both fingers, quickly narrowing the deficit.
Polson booted four goals for the Magpies and was the only player to kick multiple majors, a statistic unlikely to please coach George Jones.
“We had our chances, we had plenty of them,” he said.
“On three occasions we had blokes running into open goals from 30 metres out uncontested and we missed all three.”
The one-sided game took a dramatic seesawing twist when the Clayton team wrestled the lead from the Vampires with only minutes remaining.
Jubilant Magpie supporters erupted in celebration as their team hit the lead by five points and looked like staging a great escape from the jaws of defeat.
Enter SFL umpires David O’Hare, David Jensen, Matthew Bui.
With just seconds of play remaining, Vampire player Julian Siebrand took a mark 55 metres from the East Brighton goals and in the swirling wind would not have made the journey, without the help of the out-of-play umpire 50 metres away from where Siebrand stood.
As the officiating umpire was lining Siebrand up with the mark, the distant umpire in the Vampires goal square blew his whistle.
He claimed to have seen a Magpie player encroach the ‘exclusion zone’, the area surrounding Siebrand as he prepared to bomb the ball into the hot-spot surrounding the goal square.
The umpire charged up the ground and awarded a 50-metre penalty to Siebrand, simultaneously tearing the heart from the Magpie players and supporters.
Siebrand kicked the goal from point-blank range and secured the Vampires’ grand-final spot.
Angry spectators streamed onto the field after the siren forcing police to escort the umpires from the ground, shielding them from a barrage of insults and a number of fans spitting in their direction.
For the Magpie players, anger quickly turned to sadness as wondering minds began to question the 50-metre penalty that cost the team a season of tireless effort.
Jones said the club has had problems with umpires for a number of years.
“I’m not saying they cost us the game, they didn’t, it was our inaccuracy in front of goal, you can’t blame one incident,” he said.
“But we have had trouble with them for a long time, who knows, maybe it’s the colours.”
The Vampires tackle Balwyn this Saturday at Springvale Reserve.
