I don't think any separation occurred and my read is either did the bunker.
The boofhead said " and you can see he has not "re-gripped" the ball"
The fact that his hand was flat but still in contact with the ball all the way down didn't seem to matter to the dope.
Has the rule changed? Do you now need to "Grip" the ball when grounding?
Even the commentators seemed bemused.
This is the problem. hardly anyone even knows the rule anymore.Not so much 'grip' when grounding, but if you lose control of it and propel the ball forward, you have to 're-grip' it or regain control of it before it hits the ground, another player, the goalpost or crossbar. I can't remember the exact wording, but it was posted in a comment on one of the news articles today.
They haven't gone all the way back to the good old days of requiring proper downward pressure, it's kind of a middle ground between that and the horrible, untidy 'as long as it's still vaguely in contact with some millimetre of your body' rubbish that was being dished up a couple of years ago.
When you go to the footy take your lawyer with you to explain the rulings.
For my part, I was happy with the no-try ruling. Very happy, if it was awarded we were stuffed!