The BFNL tribunal found Horbury guilty of striking Sandhurst's Joel Wharton in the final quarter of last Saturday's game, but an unblemished record across 309 senior games in the VFL, Ballarat, Bendigo and NTFL earned the classy left-footer a reprieve from the tribunal panel.

The tribunal issued Horbury with a severe reprimand.

Reporting umpire Mark Snell told the tribunal that Horbury had struck Wharton to the head, but both Horbury and Wharton indicated that the contact was high on the chest area and not to the head.

"Don't get me wrong, I shouldn't have done it, I had a brain fade, but I didn't think it was an action I should have missed games of footy for,'' Horbury said on Thursday.

"The angle that umpire Snell was on it might have looked like I got Joel (Wharton) in the head, but I was confident I didn't strike him high.

"That's the first time I've ever been to the tribunal.... so I'm thankful the tribunal panel took my history into account.

"The decision was a great result and I'm looking forward to playing Strath on Saturday."

Horbury had been offered an automatic two-match suspension for the incident with Wharton.

A two-game ban would have sidelined Horbury for crucial games against the Storm and Golden Square.

"We're really looking forward to the challenge (of playing the Storm),'' Horbury said.

"We've got a couple of sore boys that we'll check out at training, but apart from that we've got a full squad.

"With the Storm game, and then Golden Square, we're going to get a good idea of where we sit."

The Bloods are on the rebound from their first loss of the season.

From 30 points down to Sandhurst at three quarter-time, the Bloods stormed home to hit the front in the final quarter.

However, the Dragons steadied and won by nine points.

"Sandhurst played great footy for three quarters and wanted it more than we did,'' Horbury said.

"It was really positive that after playing three quarters of poor footy we responded well to play the way we wanted to play.

"It showed we can match it with the best, but we didn't do it for four quarters.

"Hopefully, we start well against Strath and hold it for four quarters. Strath is a quality side and you need to play four quarters of footy if you're going to win the game.

"We need to play like we did against Gisborne because that was a four-quarter performance."

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