Barry Hall caught striking opponent twice in QAFL grand final
Barry Hall was captured punching one of his opponents during the QAFL grand final. Photo: Twitter
Barry Hall is at it again. This time, clobbering an opponent twice during a local footy grand final.
The former Sydney Swans star, who infamously punched West Coast’s Brent Staker in 2008, was caught on camera laying into an opposing player during the QAFL grand final between his team Labrador and Palm Beach-Currumbin.
Hall kicked two goals in Labrador’s 53-point loss.
In the footage, Hall – now 40 years old – strikes a player in the face with a swinging left arm.
Hall is then confronted by the opponent, proceeding to strike his face again, knocking him to the ground.
He has reportedly accepted a one-week suspension, down from two, after the incident was graded as intentional with low impact (open hand) and high contact.
BARRY HALL LOSES IT with back-to-back swings in @AFLQ grand final. #9News pic.twitter.com/6MEWBHQ7gH
— 9News Gold Coast (@9NewsGoldCoast) September 26, 2017
Earlier this year, Hall told AFL journalist Damian Barrett he feared he could have killed Staker with his flying punch, saying “absolutely [it] could have been worse”.
“There’s the one punch thing getting around now in society, and it happens every weekend and it has to stop because it’s dangerous,” he said in June.
That interview was conducted alongside Staker, who said he is regularly reminded of the punch.
“I don’t actively look to show anybody, clearly,” Staker said.
“It just somehow finds you every now and then.
“I’ve come to terms with it, I know that it’s going to be one incident that they remember me for.”
The 2008 punch landed Hall a seven-week suspension. His career, which ended with a brief stint with the Western Bulldogs before retiring from the AFL in 2011, was littered with similar incidents.
In 1997, he struck North Melbourne reserves player Sam McLarlane, breaking his jaw in three places, requiring the player to have it wired back together.
In 1998 he copped a four-match suspension while playing for St Kilda, dropping his knees into the head of Melbourne’s Steven Febey before slinging Adem Yze to the ground, prompting an on-field melee.
Hall managed to downgrade a level-two striking charge to level one on the eve of the 2005 grand final after punching St Kilda’s Matt Maguire in the stomach 50 metres away from play.
He was also handed a one-match ban for a strike on Collingwood’s Shane Wakelin in 2008, and fined for wrestling North Melbourne’s Scott Thompson in 2010.
-ABC
