PAUL Roos says he expects key defender Tom McDonald to remain with the club.

McDonald is out of contract at the end of the season, but believes the almost 100-gamer – he is due to notch up the ton against the Gold Coast Suns at the MCG in round 19 – will remain with Melbourne post-2016.

“I don’t have a lot to do with it. [General manager of football operations] Josh Mahoney has continual discussions with all player managers,” he said.

“We’re expecting him to stay but this time of year is as much about making sure coaches are energised and players are energised.

“As silly as it sounds, you probably spend less time worrying about contracts, even though it’s getting closer to the end of the season because a lot of those discussions have taken place. Then it becomes does the player want to stay or does he want to go.

“I won’t be involved too much in that for the rest of the season. From a coaching point-of-view, you tend to worry about it earlier in the season for some reason and once it gets towards the end, you think, ‘Well, it will play out and whatever happens, happens.’”

Meanwhile, Roos said he was confused by the rushed behind interpretations.

“When you hear Hayden [Kennedy] come out and justify [certain decisions], that’s when we all get confused. When you hear some of those terms, it adds to the confusion so yes I am confused,” he said.

“When they bring these rules in, they’re “un-umpirable.” So if you have a whole lot of “un-umpirable” rules, what the natural reaction from an umpire to do is not to continue to blow the whistle. If you umpire our game to the absolute letter of the law, how many times do you think the whistle is going to go? Hence what the umpire has to do is make all these determinations.”

Roos said he was stunned by the free kick paid against Sydney Swans captain Kieren Jack against Hawthorn at the SCG last round.

“I was perplexed by the Kierern Jack 50-metre penalty – I don’t know if Kieren was supposed to jump down a manhole, [but] I know they have those at the SCG because I’ve trained there before. I didn’t know he actually had to go sideways, I thought you could actually run through,” he said.

“I’ve said this for 10 years, it’s such a hard game to umpire and if you continually bring in rule changes; it’s very, very difficult to keep umpiring to the letter of the law. If I was an umpire, I would get sick of blowing the whistle and I think the fans get sick of hearing the whistle so the natural reaction then is [for] free kicks to drop off as the season goes on and then you get to the finals and what do we see.

“The fans love the way the umpires umpire in the finals because there’s less free kicks and then we make rule changes again. It’s really frustrating and I feel for the umpires because they’re the ones who cop the brunt and it’s not their fault; they’re not the ones who create the rule changes.”