Despite all the education and guidance, young AFL players are still falling into bad traps away from their club bubbles
AFL footballers behaving badly is not a new theme — and it will not go away regardless of all the steps being taken by the league and the clubs to educate their players.
Michelangelo Rucci
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- Port Adelaide investigating claims against Powell-Pepper
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“NOTHING good happens on Hindley Street after midnight.”
Why AFL footballers continue to put themselves at risk on the nightclub circuit — particularly when they become a beacon for trouble — remains more mysterious than how goalkicking has not improved in an era of professionalism and full-time training.
This is despite AFL players having more education, more minders and more warnings than most teenagers and 20-somethings in society.
Port Adelaide midfielder Sam Powell-Pepper is clearly in trouble with his teammates for following the neon lights to the dance floors of Adelaide’s party halls at the weekend. He will cop the wrath of the Power leadership group that has non-negotiable team rules about how the players present themselves and avoid alcohol when there are not more than eight days between AFL matches.
Powell-Pepper will need counselling about the company he keeps — always a trap for a 20-year-old living out of his home town and at risk of becoming an “instant mate” for those shady characters who want to be seen with AFL players.
There is a cautionary note on judging the allegations made against Powell-Pepper by a woman at a nightclub off Hindley St at the weekend after playing his part in Port Adelaide’s win against Brisbane to give the Power a 3-0 start to the premiership season.
There are two incidents from last year involving Port Adelaide players — defender Jackson Trengove at Glenelg and ruckman Patrick Ryder at Hindley Street — that generated great condemnation but resulted in them being cleared when fully investigated.
Trengove came to the defence of a woman while leaving a family function. Ryder was arrested while defending his brother on the AFL grand final weekend while he was on leave.
Allegations of how Powell-Pepper behaved in the Hindley Street nightclub — that have not been referred to SA Police — will be judged against the Port Adelaide Football Club’s demands that its players make “our community proud”. And there will be the AFL’s code for respect to women.
All these are tougher standards than applied to most 20-year-olds in society.
But not out of bounds right now is the debate on why would Powell-Pepper — or any AFL footballer — be on the town after midnight when there is that theme that nothing good happens on the nightclub strip after the GPO bells strike 12 times at night?
And this is where opinion becomes divided. There will be those who argue that AFL footballers have become trapped in “bubbles” in which their personality is suffocated by living in a fake world.
Others will reasonably contend that for million-dollar contracts — and the fame that comes with playing in Australia’s premier competition — it is not too much to ask a 20-year-old to ignore the dance floor at midnight to make sure he is making the right moves on the football field at the weekends.
Not in question is how an AFL player is given far more education and counselling — on lifestyle choices and social behaviour — than most 20-somethings. Millions are spent by the club, the league and the players’ union to hand AFL stars life lessons from outstanding counsellors.
But there is always one who falls between the cracks again and again to the temptation of drugs, bad company and irresponsible behaviour.
Sam Powell-Pepper’s behaviour is now in the spotlight — but he certainly will not be the last.
michelangelo.rucci@news.com.au
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