The Ashes have been reclaimed, the tennis is all over, and now we officially begin footy pre-season. It's a magical time of year where every footy fan dares to dream. Miracles happen! Your team that missed finals last year may burst out and go all the way! (Yes, even you North!)
Humans have evolved to forget many traumas of childbirth and the relentlessness of raising a baby. Which is a cunning trick by nature to trick us into having multiple children. It's the same with footy, during the barmy nights of February when we read of our heroes training the house down with their elite muscular pre-season bodies, we forget that for the majority of footy fans 2026 will end in frustration.
A large portion of that frustration will be directed at the men and women in flouro. So just to remind you that footy fandom is a cruel existence, I've researched the worst umpiring decision against each club for the 21st century:
*The point of this article isn't to name and shame umpires who've made errors. We all know it's a hard job and we're all human. Don't get personal, just yell into the abyss like a well-adjusted grown up.
Gold Coast
For all the talk of Gold Coast being the AFL's darling when they arrived in 2011, their fans have had to endure a lot of pain. In 2025, it looked like some joy was finally headed to Carrara, where the Suns just needed to beat the lowly Port Adelaide to seal their first-ever finals campaign. But sadly, the affair was Travis Boek and Ken Hinkley's last game for the Power, and so the umpires gave them a parting gift.
Mac Andrew was belted to the ground as he attempted to mark the ball for a final shot on goal. The pain of this injustice was short-lived as Gold Coast remembered they simply had to beat Essendon a few days later.
