{"id":455857,"date":"2025-07-09T20:31:24","date_gmt":"2025-07-09T20:31:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=455857"},"modified":"2025-07-09T22:14:04","modified_gmt":"2025-07-09T22:14:04","slug":"it-is-so-dangerous-great-warns-of-re-emerging-trend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=455857","title":{"rendered":"'It is so dangerous': Great warns of re-emerging trend"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rory Sloane<\/a> fears the alarming trend of tunnelling is creeping back into the game amid a growing effort by teams to find an answer to stop Western Bulldogs<\/a> gun Sam Darcy and other key forwards.<\/p>\n

Standing at 208cm tall, Darcy<\/a> is one of the toughest players to stop whenever the Bulldogs line up.<\/p>\n

And a 49-point win against North Melbourne last week put a spotlight on the re-emerging trend as Wil Dawson searched for answers in his bid to stop Darcy.<\/p>\n

PLAYER RATINGS:<\/strong> Star's 'worst game' that led to NSW implosion<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\ufeffREAD MORE:<\/strong> Munster breaks down after 'superhuman' Maroons win Origin<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Horner axed by Red Bull in Formula 1 bombshell\ufeff<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Still, the strategy could not entirely prevent Darcy from slotting goals for his team, with the key forward finding three of his four for the match in the final term.<\/p>\n

The 21-year-old's one-on-one battle raised concerns for Sloane, who fears the defensive strategies he is facing are placing him at greater risk of a severe injury.<\/p>\n

\"Bulldogs<\/p>\n

\ufeff"\ufeffObviously it is incredibly hard to defend such a big beast," Sloane said on Nine's Footy Classified<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

"But it seems that players are starting to tunnel again.<\/p>\n

"I don't know if we need to stamp it out or send a word of warning out again, but when you jump and you are falling into the hips of a player it is so dangerous.<\/p>\n

"It's not only Sam Darcy, it's Riley Thilthorpe, Josh Rachele. I'm concerned for players if they are going to pop the knee… it's how Josh Rachele did his knee<\/a> on the weekend."<\/p>\n

James Hird called for the AFL<\/a> to award free kicks in response to tunnelling.<\/p>\n

"It should be a free \ufeffkick again," James Hird added.<\/p>\n

"\ufeffAlthough, it is very hard to stop Sam Darcy. There is definitely a tactic to body check him, hit him on his chest or his backside to push him forward and stop him marking."<\/p>\n

Darcy is likely to be matched up against Adelaide Crows<\/a> key defender Jordan \ufeffButts when the Western Bulldogs take the field at Marvel Stadium on Saturday.<\/p>\n

However, Sloane does not believe concern with tunnelling will apply to Butts' game style.<\/p>\n

\"Izak<\/p>\n

\ufeff"\ufeffI think Jordan Butts plays on him this week and he very much likes to lock down and try to stop a player from jumping," he said.<\/p>\n

Footy Classified is now available as a podcast! Subscribe\/follow via<\/strong><\/em> Apple<\/strong><\/em><\/a>,<\/strong><\/em> Spotify<\/strong><\/em><\/a> or<\/strong><\/em> Google Podcasts<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

"He won't do the tunnel because he is more of a lock down kind of player. But it is going to have to come from the pressure up the field to help Jordan Butts out because Sam is too good."<\/p>\n

Nine's Tom Morris questioned if the Western Bulldogs would be considering flagging tunnelling as a concern\ufeff with the AFL if the matter is to escalate in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n

Hird replied: "I can't imagine that they wouldn't be speaking about it.<\/p>\n

"I think they would have identified it before we have."<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rory Sloane fears the alarming trend of tunnelling is creeping back into the game amid a growing effort by teams to find an answer to […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":455859,"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\/455857"}],"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=455857"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455857\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":455862,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455857\/revisions\/455862"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/455859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=455857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=455857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=455857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}