‘Like The Castle’: Fired AFL umpire coach takes on league after ‘frog march’ incident
A veteran umpires’ coach has launched unlawful dismissal proceedings against the AFL after being sacked for attempting to “frog march” a member of the public out of a training session.
Frank Kalayzich, 62, was inducted into the NSW Australian Football Hall of Fame after umpiring more than 500 senior AFL Sydney games, including 10 first-grade grand finals.
Former AFL umpire coach Frank Kalayzich (right) departs a Fair Work Commission hearing.Credit: Wolter Peeters
But he was terminated from his part-time position as an elite umpires’ coach over an altercation in which he tried to physically evict a man who was running laps at North Sydney Oval as umpires trained there on the night of April 8.
Kalayzich’s dismissal is the subject of a multi-day hearing before the Fair Work Commission, which on Monday was the setting for the kind of forensic examination of arm movement, level of force and video footage that might be expected of an incident before the AFL tribunal.
Instead of a player pleading his case to avoid a suspension, though, it is a peculiar scenario of an umpiring official challenging a sanction against him, arguing it was disproportionate.
In a case in which former AFL grand final umpires Hayden Kennedy and Ray Chamberlain gave evidence, Kalayzich is seeking reinstatement to his role, which, after 40 years’ involvement in the sport, he had not been in for the money, according to his lawyer Michael Harmer.
The man was running laps of North Sydney Oval when the alleged altercation occurred. Credit: Sam Mooy
“It’s a bit like The Castle,” Harmer told the hearing. “It’s hard to put a value on what he values in terms of his love for the game.”
The hearing was told he approached a man doing laps while a group of umpires was training, telling him the venue had been booked by the AFL and was closed to the public.
Harmer said when the man, who can’t be named for legal reasons, tried to run off to continue his exercise at the ground, Kalayzich blocked his way and started to “in effect frog march him off” the field.
Frank Kalayzich umpired more than 500 senior Sydney AFL games.
CCTV vision was shown of Kalayzich pushing him along the boundary fence before two other AFL employees arrived on the scene and eventually walked the man away.
“All I thought was ‘I just want him off the ground’. That’s all I was thinking of,” Kalayzich told the hearing before deputy president Bryce Cross.
A physical education teacher away from football, Kalayzich likened the episode to an occasion where he had to ask a parent to leave school grounds when they shouldn’t have been there, describing the man as a “trespasser”.
But barrister Chris McDermott, acting for the AFL, told Kalayzich he “had no authority whatsoever to touch him”, citing the organisation’s values and its code of conduct while cross-examining him.
McDermott said an AFL umpiring co-ordinator present on the night would give testimony that Kalayzich was holding the man’s shirt like a football player and “getting in his face”, and the man had complained of sustaining an injury to his chest.
Kalayzich, an assistant coach of umpires in the second-tier VFL, disputed that version of events, saying that while he had regrets about the evening, he had been provoked by being struck on his shoulder.
He said the man had also bent his finger back and called him a “retard”, a “tool” and “an old man”. He admitted he became frustrated and told him to “f--- off”, but denied trying to intimidate him.
Harmer told the hearing the “intruder” had been dishonest about where he lived and in claiming he had also hurt his ankle, saying data from a running app had shown he went for a five-kilometre run the next day and completed a half-marathon a month later.
“He certainly seems to be attempting to milk the AFL for compensation and to take things out on [Kalayzich],” he said.
Kennedy, who is the third on the all-time list of games umpired in the AFL and is now the VFL umpires’ head coach, said he would be willing to work with Kalayzich again if his termination was found to be unfair and he was reinstated.
But appearing via video link, the five-time grand final umpire said the incident had put into question his trust in Kalayzich, which “wouldn’t be as high as what it has been previously”.
The hearing was told that Chamberlain, who officiated in two AFL grand finals, said in a statement that Kalayzich’s reaction was “appropriate” and the AFL’s reaction to it was “disproportionate”.
The hearing continues.
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