Price of getting it wrong is too high THIS has been coming for a long time: the day when a club follows the advice of sports scientists to such an extent they stumble towards - perhaps over - the boundary that has fair play on one side of it and crass, illegal conduct on the other. And for what? Whatever some Essendon players may have taken, it was no magic potion. They finished ninth. Maybe it saved them from finishing 14th. Maybe it stopped them from finishing fifth. If they are found guilty and are heavily disciplined, their exercise will be as pointless as a bank robbery where the bandits escape with nothing more than the mints behind the front desk. AFL teams spend big on sports science because they feel it is one area where they can gain a tangible edge The only certainty is that many sporting teams are far too trusting of the hocus pocus, scientific theories that swirl around them. This was the day sport had to have - the day when a bucket of cold water was splashed across the face of a football code and warned it that scrambling searches for a minor advantage had the potential to create a Frankenstein. AFL teams spend big on sports science because they feel it is one area where they can gain a tangible edge. There are salary caps on player spending, but when it comes to budgets for football departments and sports science there is no cap and you can hire the entire NASA laboratory without a query. It's where the richer clubs, who announce million-dollar profits yearly, get an advantage over poorer rival clubs. Desperate teams take desperate measures. The same scientists who insist sportsmen ice themselves after play were applying heat, not ice, to the same body parts a couple of decades ago. In another decade they will be telling us something different again, yet the modern generation treats their advice as if they were Moses handing down the 10 Commandments. Remember the days when the Lions were chastised for letting their players stand in an ice fridge at the Gabba a decade ago? It was a breakthrough tactic then, but as simple as a children's story book compared to some of the tactics around today. Cricketer Shane Watson had cows' blood injected in his leg to stop him breaking down. It hasn't stopped him straining his leg muscles though teammates quip his three batting calls have changed to "yes," "no" and "moo." Conferences are held in an attempt to convince coaches of the benefits of the research but when the scientists are challenged they often say "if we had more money we could conduct more research and have a better idea." Sometimes you just have to trust your instincts. Essendon may learn the hard way.