Sorry might be the principal word for a lot of people after football’s supplements saga
ONE DAY soon “sorry” might be the principal word for a lot of people and organisations in football’s drugs scandal.
Mark Robinson
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ONE DAY soon “sorry” might be the principal word for a lot of people and organisations in football’s drugs scandal.
Exiled coach James Hird has said sorry three times — to the AFL Commission, in an interview outside his house and in an interview on Essendon’s website — and will say it again when Essendon allows him to speak.
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Perhaps the AFL may say sorry for their confessed “process issues” through the joint investigation with ASADA.
Perhaps even ASADA will say sorry if the Federal Court this week determines the joint investigation was unlawful, and say sorry that their interim report may have been used against its intention.
For a number of entirely different reasons, perhaps even former Essendon chairman David Evans will say sorry, and Bruce Reid, and Paul Little, and Dean Robinson, and Stephen ... no, wait, don’t think Stephen Dank will ever say sorry.
Who needs the apologies?
The fans of course.
The players, of course.
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Essendon captain Jobe Watson deserves an apology. Not least because he put up his hand and said he believed he took AOD-9604, was subjected to booing as a consequence and all the while the AFL was aware about uncertainty as to the drug’s status, but said nothing until weeks later.
Court documents released on Friday indicate that Tim Watson clearly deserves an apology. From Andrew Demetriou.
On August 5, 2013, Watson said on SEN Radio, the AFL had worked out its potential punishment before receiving the ASADA interim report (August 2) and had been “conditioning” the public for Essendon to losing premiership points.
“The AFL operate as well, in fact even better, than a political party the way that they operate – the way that they leak out information,” Watson said.
“I think they’ve already determined in their own minds, even before this report was handed down ... that would be the punishment that was actually afforded to Essendon.’’
The next day, Demetriou lashed Watson: “To suggest the AFL commission and people like Richard Goyder, the CEO of Wesfarmers, (and) Chris Lynch, who works for Rio Tinto ... would somehow pre-determine an outcome is just offensive and is completely wrong.”
Demetriou smacked Watson when all the time his deputy Gillon McLachlan and AFL integrity manager Brett Clothier were dealing with potential punishments.
The Federal Court documents allege deals were spoken of the players between ASADA and the AFL in February 2013, which were also detailed in a series of emails published by the Herald Sun in June this year.
The documents say on June 13, “it had been reported to ASADA that an AFL board meeting had discussed that “if the evidence stacks up, it would (take premiership points) off the EFC”.
The documents say, at that the same meeting, “it was reported the AFL had stated in respect to player support staff, such as Hird, that the ‘AFL will go them’.”
On June 19, in a meeting involving then ASADA chief executive Aurora Andruska and McLachlan and others, Andruska notes McLachlan saying “Final series - players in it - Essendon - can’t have this - corrupted - undermine the competition for 10 years”.
On July 24, Andruska was at another meeting, which included Demetriou. “Mrs Andruska noted that Mr Demetriou further stated ... ‘On track for 17 August - deal with clubs before finals - allows one month to deal with club - I can deal with individuals - Charge Essendon in 2-3 weeks’.”
So, Tim Watson hardly was being “offensive and completely wrong”.
Sorry, anyone?
Originally published as Sorry might be the principal word for a lot of people after football’s supplements saga
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