Damn - we only get to play them once. Good be a record small ANZ crowd.
Damn - we only get to play them once. Good be a record small ANZ crowd.
Before you criticize a man, walk a mile in his shoes. That way you'll be a mile away and he'll be shoeless.
Craig Bird is assured of playing every match this year!
That sucks for the other clubs who have taken a risk on the recruiting the bombers players.
Glad we didn't.
This decision shows the rampant corruption within the AFL. The AFL tried to manage it, cover it up, then put up a sham tribunal to let them off.
If the AFL has any integrity, members of the board and executive team must stand down.
Contrast, how the NRL and Cronulla handled it. Admitted it, got it over and done with.
This.Originally Posted by barry
The AFL has been exposed for what it really is - an organisation addicted to expediency, deal-cutting and appeasement of powerful interests and insiders (like Fat Eddie - just kidding mate, you're a ripping bloke who loves a laugh and I'm just having a bit of fun with you, your bloated crimson face, your poisonous mouth and your 97 chins. I know you'll take this friendly ribbing in the right spirit).
It must have come as a rude shock to this bunch of preening egomaniacs to find that their back room deals meant nothing on the world stage and that they could no longer pull strings and manipulate outcomes. By penalising clubs for following the rules, for example. Up yours Dill you lamentable invertebrate excuse for a CEO.
My opinion is objective truth in its purest form
I actually feel deeply sorry for the players, as they were clearly duped. They've lost three years of their careers already, and for older ones like Watson, he'll probably tell the game to get stuffed, as he should.
As for Hird ('we'll be in a great position when this is all done'), the dopers themselves in Robinson and Dank, and the idiotic board, who decided to fight them at all costs rather than take an early plea and be done with it, what a batch of tools - ruining careers in the way they have.
One sliding doors element to this - apparently, a year or two back, Crameri wanted to cop an early plea and short sentence, but caved in under pressure from his former teammates. If he folded his cards, what would have happened?
And it's also a nice backhander to the AFL. They thought they could squeeze their own arrangements around this with the finals exclusion, 12 month suspension of Hird etc. But their dirty governance didn't stand up to independent scrutiny.
Anyway, a lot of lawsuits to follow. Essendon and the AFL (as the effective employers) have some big bills coming their way.
'Delicious' is a fun word to say
Your post just about sums up the whole fiasco, the AFL & Essendon Board badly screwed up with the players and fans suffering.
Yeah, I don't. Somebody sticks a needle in my arm, and I'm a professional athlete, then I blame myself, and they should blame themselves. Idiots.
AFL will get what they deserve for the way they handled it.
The difference between insanity and genius is measured only in success.
I understand where you are coming from re the players, and that's the base principle of the doping code - and some of the CAS findings make clear the players were negligent at best.
I think I was more getting to the point that of all the people to cop punishment in this, those that orchestrated the scheme get off lightly - or in Hird's case, with a million dollar bonus and free study leave - or those in positions of power that should have had good governance in place to prevent it - their CEO of the time is now running an A-league club - whereas the players have careers ruined.
And not just those that doped. Think of a young draftee this year - say a talent like their first pick. He's done nought wrong, but his first few years in the system will be cruelled through having to play in a side devoid of talent around him, pushed into situations he shouldn't be because others are absent, and is now stuck at a club distracted and demoralised by the whole shebang. Is his whole career effected as a consequence? Arguably yes.
'Delicious' is a fun word to say
Thoroughly agree.
My approach to the players' situation from the beginning was that all they needed to do was ask the team doctor about the injections, and if they did, they would have fulfilled any reasonable standard requirement. Now it emerges that the players, as well as the coaches (note the plural) kept it secret from the DOCTOR! And some are already complaining about 12 months; they should be grateful it wasn't two years.
He reminds him of the guys, close-set, slow, and never rattled, who were play-makers on the team. (John Updike, seeing Josh Kennedy in a crystal ball)
I agree. They obviously knew what they were doing was wrong or they would not have kept it secret. Lets not pretend they are children. Most of them are are grown men.
I agree to this up to a certain point.The established star players sure but the the younger up and coming were really under pressure to do it and , as the stars did it ,if they didn't it would be the end of their career , at least at Essendon..The playing group had to make a stand , and they didn't.
Gee , James Hird has really come out of this caked in mud. One wonders how his lawyer wife let him do it . Perhaps he fessed up to her after it hit the fan and all she could do was damage control.
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