The incident occurred in an AFLW practice match prior to the season<\/a> and left Stack with a fracture of the C7 vertebra in her neck, unable to partake in sport for 12 weeks.<\/p>\nWhile Stack avoided a serious injury and is expected to make a full recovery, doctors said she was "millimetres" from a life-altering spinal injury.<\/p>\n
While Marinoff was initially suspended for forceful front-on contact, the appeals board upheld Adelaide's argument that the two-time All-Australian had no opportunity to avoid the collision.<\/p>\n
The decision did not sit well with Stack, who said her "heart sank" as she "broke down in tears" when learning of the appeals board's call.<\/p>\n
"The emotional trauma of dealing with such a serious injury was exacerbated when the blame for what had happened suddenly seemed to be sitting at my door," she wrote in the Irish Examiner<\/em>.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/prod.static9.net.au\/fs\/82c70ae5-6482-4ba3-8a9e-a99c7404f334\")
<\/p>\n
"The tribunal had access to a second camera angle, which conclusively proved that my feet were planted, that I had my head over the ball, and I didn't have any forward momentum."<\/p>\n
"Most importantly of all though, the footage shows how Marinoff takes three steps forward from when I plant my feet until she made contact with my head.<\/p>\n
"The AFL repeatedly stress is that the duty of care lies with the player who chooses to bump or tackle, no matter the opponent's position."<\/p>\n
While Marinoff is expected to make a full recovery, she said that learning how close she came to having her life changed forever was frightening.<\/p>\n
"I'm due my follow-up X-ray on Tuesday, which will tell a lot," she wrote.<\/p>\n
"When I first met with the head spinal consultant, he was initially very worried. It's a very cold and very sobering experience to hear that not being paralysed came down to a matter of millimetres. <\/p>\n
"In that context, I'm just so, so thankful that I am almost fully functioning again, and that I have now have a plan in place to get back to full fitness."<\/p>\n
For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by clicking here!<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Irish GWS recruit Brid Stack has slammed the AFLW's decision to overturn a three-match suspension imposed on Adelaide's Ebony Marinoff for a high hit that […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28891"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28891"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28891\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28893,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28891\/revisions\/28893"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}