‘Staggering’ holes in the AFL’s emergency protocols might have even impacted the Elijah Hollands situation.

AFL announces reforms after Petracca injury investigation

After 681 days, the AFL has finally completed its investigation into the failings at play when former Melbourne midfielder Christian Petracca was hospitalised with a lacerated spleen.

The Demons’ 2021 Norm Smith medallist — now a star for the Gold Coast Suns — copped a crippling knock to his body during the King’s Birthday clash with Collingwood in 2024 and missed the remainder of the year because of it.

That’s despite being sent back out onto the field during the game, before Melbourne later learned the seriousness of the injury, which saw him taken into the intensive care unit at the Alfred Hospital for several days.

Petracca became disgruntled with the club over its handling of the injury at the time and in the months following, which ultimately led him requesting a trade at the end of 2024 and then again in 2025, when he had his wish granted and moved north.

The investigation uncovered four findings which will be introduced into the AFL’s protocol when a player suffers a serious injury.

First, there will be changes to pre-match briefings, which will include a more comprehensive plan for match-day workers and medical staff, and detailing local emergency hospitals and necessary communication channels in the case of an emergency.

Second, the AFL is going to align the processes across all states and venues — which is currently not the case.

“That staggered me when I found out,” The Agenda Setters’ Tom Morris noted of the discrepancies.

Third, there will be a mandatory bi-annual emergency care course for club doctors, physios and head trainers.

And finally, the AFL will tighten its audit process by introducing automatic review into all emergency match-day incidents, which is in line with the public heath system.

“Until now, they’ve just cherry-picked which ones they want to review,” Morris added.

“Now, every single emergency that happens on the football field will be reviewed.

“I think anything that requires immediate emergency care (will be considered an emergency). Not a hamstring, obviously. Something that requires care beyond the football field, so automatically to the hospital, someone who gets concussed, rib injuries, ACLs — they will all be reviewed.”

The findings are all “common sense” outcomes from the review, according to Nick Riewoldt.

But the question still begs: why did it take so long?

“It took so long because the AFL is a slow-moving beast,” Morris said.

“And I think that part of the reason (former AFLPA CEO) Paul Marsh was done at the AFL Players’ Association, by his own accord, was he was sick of how long everything takes at the AFL, the bureaucracy that the AFL is.

“And you could argue — and this is just an argument that’s been made by a chief executive this week, to me — that if there had been processes in place, Carlton might have been better equipped to handle the Elijah Holland situation, and so would the AFL industry.”