Adelaide reopens old wounds and adds new ones that are self inflicted
Port Adelaide’s mantra is ‘never tear us apart’ and the team it smashed in Saturday night’s Showdown, Adelaide, is now doing exactly that to itself.
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Port Adelaide’s mantra is ‘never tear us apart’ and now the team it smashed in Saturday night’s Showdown is tearing itself apart at the seams.
A three-year battle to rid itself of a series of unfortunate events which have morphed into one giant crisis has now opened an old wound and it’s self-inflicted.
Football director Mark Ricciuto’s decision to publicly release the salaries of the players who have left the club since the 2017 grand final was his attempt at honesty for supporters who have demanded to know why.
But instead his comments came across as disparaging and disrespectful and raked over the coals of a bonfire it has spent all this time trying to put out.
And all that comes on the back of a public fight with its greatest ever player Andrew McLeod and its only premiership coach, Malcolm ‘The Messiah’ Blight who called Matthew Nicks’ defensive gameplan “rubbish” on radio this week.
“A rookie coach with a rookie idea,” Blight said.
This isn’t some sort of conspiracy anymore as some fans would have you believe, it’s not the media ganging up on the Crows, this is arguably its three biggest names making the type of headlines it would want to avoid.
Ricciuto is the football director, McLeod was still working there until three months ago and Blight was made a life member in January.
‘Roo’ had everything to lose and nothing to gain by picking off Jake Lever, Charlie Cameron, Mitch McGovern, Josh Jenkins and Hugh Greenwood one-by-one on radio.
We know they left for big money. Whether it was $500,000 or $800,000 is irrelevant. The fact is only really Greenwood left on good terms, so something else was at play, but they’ve all maintained a fairly dignified silence.
Adelaide needed to as well.
It can’t be easy being an AFL club powerbroker and full-time media personality, trying to please both parties. Eddie McGuire, David Koch and James Brayshaw have all done it and over stepped the mark at times.
Intentionally or not, Koch has put the blowtorch on his club and coach at Port Adelaide in the past, but there’s a big difference between criticising your team’s performance and airing your club’s dirty laundry.
Ricciuto is raw, passionate, emotional and unpolished and that’s what many love - tradies listening to him at work, those having a beer with him at the Alma or standing next to him at Waikierie Oval.
But the AFL world is a very different beast and as a club official - football director no less - so are the public expectations.
It’s an issue that Adelaide’s board must now address. But does it care? The board may well be led by Ricciuto when Rob Chapman stands down this year.
The pair was spotted at Pranzo in the city on Tuesday where the Showdown loss would have been front of mind.
If they’re there again today the agenda might be very different and top of the list should be uniting a club that seems to be dividing and punishing itself.