“The look of it is just terrible for the game – I find it hard to believe that this is the fact,” he said on 3AW.

Goal umpires trained at Scotch on Tuesday evening, while the field umpires were confined to the ARC after being told the turf was off limits.

Umpires received notification from the AFL this week that training would have to start earlier than usual because of the lack of stadium lighting at the school’s practice oval.

“The college does not have lights so it is important that these sessions get underway as close to 5.15pm as possible to make use of the daylight we have available,” the internal memo, seen by this masthead, read.

When contacted for comment, an AFL spokesperson said the league would make sure the umpires were back training at Marvel Stadium this week, but refused to comment on the record as to the impact of field umpires not being able to train at all this week.

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The league conceded it was not ideal that the umpires only had access to the main oval change rooms, where there were no female change rooms.

On Tuesday night, the rooms had to be vacated by all men to allow Chelsea Roffey – the only Victorian female goal umpire – to get changed.

The AFL has been heavily criticised for admitting Izak Rankine should have received a free kick in the dying stages of the Crows’ loss to the Suns, with two-time Geelong premiership coach Chris Scott labelling it as “laughable.”

“What’s rare is that the AFL voluntarily come out and clarify it [costly late-game umpiring mistakes]. Most of the time that clarification happens behind closed doors,” Scott told reporters.

“The idea that this is a remarkable situation because a mistake was made in a close call, a 50-50, is laughable. Those sort of errors, when you get the benefit of slow motion replays and you say, ‘OK, based on what we can see now, that’s an error’ – that happens a lot. I don’t think you should isolate it and say, ‘Hey this is one of those ultra-rare examples where a team was cost a game.’

“So, I don’t understand the overreaction from the AFL, personally … I think they’ve got a choice. They can be completely transparent and clarify every single mistake, so everyone knows, or don’t do it at all. But when you cherry-pick examples because of public pressure, I think that’s an error.”

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