‘Intimate’ Piercing Results In Red Card

File this under ‘strangest football story you’ll read all day’. Old Hill Wanderers AFC, of the Australia’s vicSoccer league, have been forced to post an apology regarding the ‘negative attention’ that arose following an ‘unfortunate event’ in which a player was sent off. But this wasn’t just a normal sending off, no. In fact, it may have been the first case of a player being dismissed for refusing to expose himself to the referee for a second time.

Let’s back up a bit. Aaron Ecclestone is an Old Hill Wanderers player, and he was hit in the groin in the first half of a match against the Swinburne University Reserves, which is an occupational hazard of playing football. Apparently in some pain and writhing around on the floor, he ‘instinctively’ pulled down his shorts to make sure all of his bits were still there, and when he did that, the referee spotted a flash of metal - a piercing.

Wearing jewelry isn’t allowed during football matches, so it had to go, and Ecclestone was dispatched to the sidelines to remove it, which is when things went from slightly odd to downright silly. First of all, he came back onto the pitch before being given permission, for which he received a yellow card, and secondly he refused to prove to the match officials that the piercing had been removed out of modesty. He was therefore shown a second yellow per the rules of the game in what essentially amounts to a sending off for not flashing the referee. Excellent.

Ecclestone probably isn’t too pleased about the red card, but what may be worse for him is that absolutely everyone knows he’s an... ahem. Marked man?

I’m sure Mrs. Ecclestone was dreaming that some day her son might be famous, but it probably wasn’t like this.