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THE AFL tribunal has upheld the match review panel's findings and suspended Hamish Hartlett for two weeks for striking Hawthorn's Cyril Rioli.

Lawyers for Port Adelaide tried to argue the impact was 'low impact' not 'medium impact', which would have reduced the penalty to 93.75 points with an early guilty plea - which Hartlett had entered.

The charge by the match review panel was deemed intentional, medium impact and body contact, which draws 225 demerit points and a two-game suspension. Hartlett will have 25 carry-over points.

Hartlett left the tribunal saying he was 'shattered'.

Club lawyer Ben Krupka showed the AFL DVD of incidents deemed to be low impact, believing Hartlett's contact was in this category

"The DVD is the only means of creating a precedent to judge cases," Mr Krupka said.

"The incident looks innocuous and Rioli didn't double over immediately unlike the examples on the AFL DVD.

"There was no real swing of the arm or shoulder in this incident.

"Rioli was on the ground for a short time and then ran off the ground. He was able to continue playing and kicked a goal from 50m at the start of the second quarter."

Hartlett gave evidence saying Rioli was the one to initiate contact.

"Rioli bumped me two or three times, which I ignored, but it prevented me from running up the ground to lead for a pass," Hartlett said.

"I tried to sidestep him (Rioli) and he grabbed my hand. I apologised to him after the game and had no intention of trying to injure him, I was just trying to get past him."

Jeff Gleeson argued on behalf of the AFL and said Rioli told the AFL investigation the blow left him winded and was quite forceful.

"Rioli was genuinely gasping for air," Mr Gleeson said.

"He didn't move from all fours for a considerable period of time despite play going on.

"You can't read too much into the fact Rioli took a couple of steps after the blow before going down because he was off the ground for the rest of the quarter (about two minutes)."

Hartlett will miss matches against West Coast and Brisbane at home before returning to face Richmond at the MCG in the final match for 2012.