{"id":70512,"date":"2021-05-12T22:30:01","date_gmt":"2021-05-12T22:30:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=70512"},"modified":"2021-05-12T23:01:43","modified_gmt":"2021-05-12T23:01:43","slug":"afl-legend-lauds-richmonds-brawl-response","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=70512","title":{"rendered":"AFL legend lauds Richmond's brawl response"},"content":{"rendered":"

AFL legend Shane Crawford has backed Richmond's refreshing decision not to sanction Daniel Rioli and Shai Bolton after the pair were involved in a Melbourne nightclub brawl over the weekend.<\/a><\/p>\n

"How good are the Richmond Football Club? Obviously a couple of their players get into a bit of trouble [and] most AFL clubs and sporting clubs would go, 'Do you know what? We're going to suspend you and you're out for a few weeks and we might fine you as well.' Whereas the Richmond Football Club and Damien Hardwick said, 'Nah, we love you guys, you're OK, let's just get on with it, don't get yourself in that situation ever again'," Crawford said on Today<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

"I love it. I love the reaction.<\/p>\n

"People are going, 'How dare you not fine them and suspend them', but that's just the Richmond Football Club understanding their players, knowing whether or not they did the wrong or right thing. In this case they just think they stood up for themselves.<\/p>\n

"Let's just get on with footy."<\/p>\n

\"Shai<\/p>\n

Earlier this week Tigers coach Damien Hardwick revealed that Bolton and Rioli would not face punishment<\/a> from the club after the incident in which Rioli's girlfriend Paris Lawrence was subjected to inappropriate behaviour, prompting the Richmond star to confront the patron. According to a club statement, Rioli was then punched by the patron and "suffered a cut under his eye that required two stitches". Bolton joined the scuffle and suffered a broken wrist as a result.<\/p>\n

"I can understand the fixation on our players, but from our point of view, our player's partner is put in an inappropriate situation that she didn't feel comfortable with and Daniel stood up and tried to eradicate the situation and was punched in the eye," he told Fox Footy's AFL360<\/em>.<\/p>\n

"I don't condone violence, but the reality is put anyone in that situation and they're going to stand up for their partner and their mates. It was a difficult situation and it's not one we'd ideally want to be in, but the reality is we are where we are.<\/p>\n

"We've spoken to the players at length and we go through a thorough process. We've got to the bottom of it with the evidence we've got and the story we have, so from our point of view we back in the players.<\/p>\n

"We're disappointed it's come to that situation and we don't condone violence, but we understand these situations happen from time to time, but it doesn't make it right."<\/p>\n

\"Richmond<\/p>\n

The AFL Integrity Unit is still investigating the incident, but the Richmond duo received support from AFL Players Association president Patrick Dangerfield who blamed "d—heads" on social media that seek to provoke a reaction from star players when out and about.<\/p>\n

"The challenges are, especially when you go out and you let your hair down after a stressful week, you're dealing with d—heads that pull out their phones at a nightclub and are just trying to film something on social media," Dangerfield told Melbourne radio station SEN.<\/p>\n

"They're looking for a reaction. You're on a [hiding] to nothing as a player.<\/p>\n

"We've got to treat our players like adults and they've got to be able to enjoy themselves but you do deal with members of the general public that are out there for nothing but trouble.<\/p>\n

"I really sympathise with the boys because they're in a really difficult situation where something inappropriate happens to a partner, and maybe with wiser heads you might react differently but that's easy to say from the grandstand.<\/p>\n

"It's a different thing in the heat of the moment where you're like, 'This is crap, this is inappropriate, I'm not dealing with this'."<\/p>\n

Bolton<\/a> is set to miss up to a month after undergoing surgery on his wrist but Rioli is expected to play against GWS Giants at Marvel Stadium this Saturday.<\/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<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0clicking here!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AFL legend Shane Crawford has backed Richmond's refreshing decision not to sanction Daniel Rioli and Shai Bolton after the pair were involved in a Melbourne […]<\/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\/70512"}],"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=70512"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70512\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70514,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70512\/revisions\/70514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=70512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=70512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=70512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}