Mangoplah-Cookardinia United-Eastlakes lose Andrew Dickins to two-week suspension after failing to overturn headbutting charge

Dickins headed to the AFL Riverina independent tribunal on Thursday night in a bid to clear his name after he was reported for an incident involving Wagga Tigers ruckman Tom Osmotherly last week.

However, the tribunal upheld the charge which was graded intentional, low impact and high contact.

Dickins could've accepted a week's suspension with an early guilty plea but the club appealed in a bid to have it overturned.

"We contested the charge for a reason, we do think that headbutting is a really malicious charge to have laid against someone and we backed in the version of events which said there was no headbutt and the contact was accidental," MCUE coach Jeremy Rowe said.

"We're disappointed that we're without Dicko, who's a really important player for us, for a couple of weeks. We're disappointed with the outcome but you obviously have to take these (decisions), accept them and move forward."

Dickins will miss their first two home games of the season, against Coolamon on Saturday and Leeton-Whitton in round four, which Rowe concedes is a significant blow.

"Dicko's definitely a pretty big point of difference for us. He's a quality around-ground ruckman. He's good with his hands. He's got a real presence for and he's been marking the footy really well up forward so he's a definite loss for us and there's no point in trying to sugarcoat that," Rowe said.

"However, every single team at some stage has to deal with unavailabilities or injuries or whatever it may be and you just back in the depth of your squad... it'll just mean that our systems and structures change up a little bit and it's a good challenge for us to see if we can find some other avenues and other ways and go from there."

Rowe will return for the Goannas after a minor quad strain forced his late withdrawal last week. He said they're well aware of the challenge presented by Coolamon after watching them beat Ganmain-Grong Grong-Matong last week.

"I think that their midfield is absolutely elite," Rowe said.

"Obviously Jake Barrett's the buzz player of the competition at the moment but it goes further than that - Nick Pleming's a solid contributor, Max Hillier is a great contributor, Luke Redfern's got a lot of talent.

"It's going to be a great challenge for our midfield to step up and have a crack at them head to head."

Rowe also identified Jerry Maslin and Joe Redfern as dangers up forward for Coolamon.

MCUE started the season with a narrow loss to Turvey Park and then took it to Wagga Tigers for the first half last week before being brought undone, making for a winless start.

Rowe said he couldn't fault his players' intensity and approach and just wants to see them "put a bit of icing on our cake".

"To put it in simple terms, we need to make the game a little bit easier on ourselves," he said.

"When we're having to work and fight for scraps for every single metre gained, it is very draining on the players and it's difficult to sustain that for four quarters.

"If we can execute our decision-making and skills, and abide by the ball movement patterns we religiously practice during training, then we suspect the game will become easier and there'll be some more fruits to our labour...

"We do have an element of confidence, despite the fact that we're 0-and-2, that our best footy will put us in a position where we can match it with any side in the competition at this early stage."

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