Melbourne defender Bernie Vince says teammate Heritier Lumumba looks set to retire from the AFL but insists the club’s doctors aren’t at fault.
Lumumba is considering legal action against the Demons and looks certain to have played his final game for the club amid a dispute over their handling of his concussion.
The 2010 All-Australian defender claims Melbourne stopped him playing this season when he felt he had recovered from his concussion problems.
Lumumba only managed five senior games in his second season with the Demons and did not play in the senior side after concussing himself in round six.
He suffered another knock to the head in his comeback game in the VFL several weeks later.
Lumumba, a premiership player with Collingwood in 2010, has just finished the second year of a three-year deal with Melbourne and claims the lack of games this season meant he could not use a trigger clause in his contract for a fourth year.
The Demons are adamant they handled the situation appropriately, and veteran defender Vince on Thursday questioned whether Lumumba would have earned another game even if he had been cleared to play.
“It’s real messy – how do you prove that he didn’t play because of his head or he wasn’t selected?” Vince told radio station Nova 100.
“The doctors take a more precautionary side of things with head knocks and they leave you out for an extra week or an extra couple of weeks just to be careful, so for him to say they didn’t treat it right was a bit disappointing.
“We think that we’ve got the best medicos in the comp. They’re very cautious on that issue.
“I don’t know the full ins and outs and I’m not sure if he’s retiring or not. It looks like he is.”
Demons coach Simon Goodwin earlier this month said Lumumba had been cleared of his symptoms and was poised to return to training.
Lumumba has sought further medical advice and has been in contact with the AFL players association as he considers his next move.
One of the AFL’s most enigmatic characters, Lumumba has played 223 senior games – 199 for the Magpies and 24 at Melbourne.
AFL chief Gillon McLachlan on Thursday said he was comfortable with the league’s concussion protocols.
“We’ve clearly, for many years now, had some consternation from the wider public, so we made the head sacrosanct and made changes to our rules to make sure that that is the case,” McLachlan told reporters.
“We have clear concussion protocols on the (interchange) bench. We have the primacy of the doctor in making any decision about whether the player returns and we are investing significant money in concussion research.”
