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Sport
Alex Mitchell

Lions star Hipwood to face AFL tribunal

Brisbane key forward Eric Hipwood will be the only player facing the AFL Tribunal after all other round-16 charges were accepted.

Richmond coach Damien Hardwick had indicated on Monday night that they would challenge Nick Vlastuin's one-game ban, but they have had a change of heart.

Vlastuin was charged with striking West Coast's Connor West.

Hawthorn's Will Day also took his one-game suspension for forceful front-on contact against GWS star Josh Kelly.

The other 10 charges were all fines.

Hipwood was referred directly to the tribunal for an unusual incident where he pushed Western Bulldogs opponent Ryan Gardner.

The contact sent Gardner into the path of field umpire Jacob Mollison and they had a heavy collision.

AFL match review officer Michael Christian did not grade the incident.

It appears Hipwood's defence on Tuesday night will centre around Gardner deliberately moving into his path to block him from running his desired pattern, leading to the push.

Brisbane head of football Danny Daly said the incident was unremarkable outside of the consequential umpire contact.

"We are putting a case together to show what happened in this instance is a normal forward line pattern ... it is just unfortunate it happened to be the case that there was an umpire," he told RadioTAB.

"It is one of those incidents that probably hasn't occurred in terms of a player being pushed into an umpire and both going to ground."

It has put umpire contact back on the agenda, but Hipwood appears unlikely to receive a lengthy ban like GWS star Toby Greene's six-match suspension for bumping an umpire in last year's elimination final.

Former Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley said if it could be proved Hipwood had designed to create the umpire contact he should receive a long ban, but he believed that wasn't the case.

"If they feel there's something in it, it needs to be bigger than (one match) ... it's either nothing, or more," he told Fox Footy.

"I think that he'll be cleared on that."

Former St Kilda captain Nick Riewoldt said there was "no way" Hipwood could be suspended.

"The burden of proof is on the AFL to prove he deliberately pushed him into the umpire, and how can you prove that?" he told Fox Footy.

"To, in a split second, come to the conclusion that if I push my opponent right now, the umpire is coming across, they're gonna hit ... no."

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