The worst umpiring stuff-up of the season cost this AFL team a win – but now one of the club’s stars is telling furious fans to blame them instead

• Crows suffered a devastating one-point loss on Saturday 
• The AFL has admitted Adelaide were ripped off by decision 

By STEVE LARKIN FOR AUSTRALIAN ASSOCIATED PRESS and SHAYNE BUGDEN FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA

Frustrated Adelaide players are blaming themselves, not an umpiring error, for their controversial one-point loss to Gold Coast.

The AFL has admitted an umpiring mistake cost the Crows a chance to win Saturday’s thriller, but the confession has been met with a collective shrug by Adelaide officials and players.

There were just 90 seconds left in the match with the Crows down by one point when Izak Rankine appeared to mark within easy scoring distance, only to be tackled by Suns star Sam Collins, with the ball spilling out.

The umpire should have either awarded the mark, or given Rankine a free kick for being held illegally during the contest. 

It’s the fourth time in Adelaide’s past 35 games the AFL has conceded an umpiring error went against the Crows in a narrow loss, leaving their fans livid – but apparently they’ve got it all wrong.

‘Given that I am new, I don’t have that attachment to the previous decisions,’ forward Alex Neal-Bullen told reporters on Monday.

Pictured: The moment Adelaide’s Izak Rankine (right) had his potentially game-winning mark illegally ruined by the Gold Coast’s Sam Collins 

Rankine’s teammate Alex Neal-Bullen (pictured playing against the Suns) has a message for furious fans: the loss was the players’ fault

‘[Chief executive] Tim Silvers summed it up very well yesterday with the statement he made: there’s not much the AFL can do.

‘Us now, as a footy team we have just got to move on.

‘Our ability now is to put energy into the upcoming game because if we look too far back, you often find you drop the ball a bit.’

Silvers on Sunday said the AFL concession was of ‘no use or benefit’ to the Crows.

But Neal-Bullen, who left Melbourne to join the Crows this season and instantly was elected to the leadership group, said players are blaming themselves for the shattering loss, not the officials.

‘Whenever you lose a tight game like that, it’s obviously devastating,’ he said.

‘We’re all competitors in the industry, being a professional athlete.

‘The one thing with that, though, it wasn’t the sole moment that cost us the game.

The take from Neal-Bullen (pictured left in action against the Gold Coast) will do little to calm Crows fans who’ve had enough of the AFL’s mistakes costing them games

‘There are other key moments where we could have done a little bit better as a team – and that moment in particular was out of that control.

‘We have just got to continue to play the game.

‘It has been a theme of our footy club this pre-season since I’ve arrived here, our ability to stay in the moment … deal with challenges.’

And the 180-gamer dismissed calls for the AFL to adopt a system similar to soccer’s video assistant referee (VAR).

‘I love our game because it’s always moving,’ Neal-Bullen said.

‘You see the sports in other countries that are a bit stop-start.

‘Any other delays, the game would be across too many hours, and you just want to continue to move with it as a player.’

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The worst umpiring stuff-up of the season cost this AFL team a win – but now one of the club’s stars is telling furious fans to blame them instead

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