Swans caught with pants down
Tim Morrissey and Mark Schliebs
10feb06
SWANS star Tadhg Kennelly was the first to admit that dacking a teammate in front of nearly 400 Catholic high school girls in Wollongong yesterday was the dumbest thing he'd ever done.
Kennelly will attend St Mary's Star of the Sea College today to apologise again to the school and the students for his inappropriate prank. Kennelly dacked teammate Lewis Roberts-Thomson in front of the school girls from Years 7 to 12 during a question and answer session yesterday.
"It's probably the dumbest thing I've ever done," Kennelly said. "We'd been swimming earlier so I knew LRT (Roberts-Thomson) had his speedos on, but there's no excuse for it.
"The question at the time was, `What was your most embarrassing moment?', and Lewis actually said nothing and that's when I dacked him.
"I wasn't thinking and thought it would be funny."
The reigning AFL premier is in Wollongong this week as part of the AFL's community camps.
Kennelly and Sydney coach Paul Roos went back to the school yesterday to formally apologise to St Mary's principal Fay Gurr and the Swans Irish star will return today with co-captain Brett Kirk.
"I'm actually going to head back to the school tomorrow and just talk to the girls and apologise to them because it was pretty inappropriate," Kennelly said.
"At the time no one else knew what I knew and Lewie knew about the speedos, but it was pretty silly."
Gurr, who initially wasn't sure what the term "dacking" entailed, said that although she didn't see the incident she heard about it and wouldn't say if she thought the prank was immature.
"It certainly was an unexpected response to a question in front of a group of girls,"she said. Gurr said Kennelly's actions would not be mimicked in the schoolyard.
"They (the girls) have a very clear understanding about how to behave," she said. "I don't think it will inspire them to do that at all."
Roos said there was no need to fine or reprimand Kennelly further after the dashing defender accepted full responsibility for his actions.
"It's about accepting responsibility for your actions that's what we are all about here at the Swans," Roos said.
"I guess you can debate punishment and all those sorts of things but the most important thing for us as a footy club is to have good role models and good people and characters.
"If mistakes are made we want you to put your hand up and accept the consequences and Tadhg was very keen to get back to the school as quick as he could and very keen to speak to the students tomorrow."
Swans chief executive Myles Baron-Hay, who learned of the Kennelly incident late yesterday, endorsed the way the club and its player handled the situation.
"Tadhg is embarrassed by it and realises it's the wrong thing to do and has unreservedly apologised," Baron-Hay said.
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