“I don’t put two and two together and get nine”: Buckley, Cornes feud over controversial Jordan De Goey bump

Kane Cornes and Nathan Buckley have gone toe-to-toe on the topic of Magpies midfielder Jordan De Goey's ugly hit on West Coast Eagles midfielder Elijah Hewett on Saturday, with Buckley hitting out at the "hysteria" surrounding De Goey's election to bump.

The incident occurred during Collingwood's victory over West Coast at Optus Stadium, with De Goey ultimately referred directly to the AFL Tribunal after his act left the young Eagle concussed and removed from the contest.

Cornes and Buckley fiercely debated the issue on SEN Breakfast on Monday, with the Collingwood legend adamant the incident was "a football action" and that the situation has caused an overreaction by some.

"[De Goey] definitely deserves to be up at the tribunal, and he'll get the weeks he deserves, for mine it's a three (match suspension), but I think the reaction post this incident has been over the top," began Buckley.

"It's a football action, it's an instinctive football action, it's one that's not accepted in the game now, there were no raised elbows, there was no real jumping off the ground.

Cornes, scathing in his assessment of De Goey's hit, was categorically opposed to Buckley's stance.

"Explain how that's a football action ... that was a weak act," said the ex-Port Adelaide player.

"I don't agree with you at all," countered Buckley, who also insinuated Cornes was trying to tie the incident to De Goey's non-football troubles in recent times.

"And there was obviously stuff that you tried to wrap in about his off-field misdemeanours ... I don't put two and two together and get nine."

Cornes claimed De Goey's talent has been wasted by his off-field decision-making.

"I genuinely think it has been a waste of the talent that he's got, and largely due to his own fault."

However, Buckley persevered in his defence of his ex-disciple, citing the diverse upbringings, opinions and motivations that culminate in people, and reiterated that De Goey's decision was a split-second one and not a premeditated one.

"You're judging that every player needs to have a certain level of professionalism and an understanding of what it takes to be an AFL footballer ... there's different upbringings, there's different ways of seeing the world, there's different motivations that come into play to pull the final package together," Buckley stated.

"But all of that is separate to what happened on the field with De Goey, that was a knee-jerk, instant, blink-of-an-eye outcome, that I don't think that five metres before [the site of the contest] he was thinking he was going to iron the kid out.

Additionally, Buckley offered an opinion that players should do a more adequate job of shielding themselves from foreseeable contact.

"I'm thinking he's thinking he's going to go in and tackle him, I think that there's a responsibility for players to look after themselves on the football field that players have been absolved of.

"The individual needs to look after himself. After [Hewett] handballed, he was probably half a second from protecting himself, he was in the process of getting his arm up and protecting himself.

Cornes wasn't having a bar of that, taking a shot at Buckley's lenience towards De Goey.

"You're being incredibly lenient, Bucks ... this is a defenceless player who's got rid of the ball and he's jumped off the ground and smashed him with his shoulder in the head."

Buckley doubled down on his stance that Hewett, and others alike, should be expecting contact on a football field.

"He's not a defenceless player, he's a footballer on an AFL field ... you're on a football field, you should be expecting contact."

Unsurprisingly, the pair couldn't see eye-to-eye.

De Goey's Tribunal sentence means the previously-Brownlow-contending Magpie will miss the next three games, at minimum, automatically ruling him out of Collingwood's upcoming clashes with Melbourne on King's Birthday, the Adelaide Crows in Round 15 and the Gold Coast Suns in Round 16.