Jay Clark: A look at the disastrous decade that led to Essendon’s latest turmoil

At the end of 2020, Essendon was slammed by a legend, its players fed up. Star Adam Saad had lost faith and was out the door. Amid more turmoil, can you blame him?

Adam Saad left Essendon because he lost faith in the direction of the club.

When Essendon legend Tim Watson launched into a savage assessment of the Bombers at the end of 2020, it was clear some of the players were fed up. Had a gut full.

Saad went to Carlton, Joe Daniher fled to Brisbane after failing to get to Sydney Swans the year before and Orazio Fantasia went home to Port Adelaide after a difficult year in the hub.

The Bombers had already been ripped apart by the supplements scandal, hit hard by draft pick punishments and had not won a final since 2004.

So when it all went belly up again in 2020, Watson was blunt about his club’s position.

“He (Saad) lost faith in where the club is going,” Watson said on SEN.

“He’s been there for three years and, after that period of time, he has decided, ‘I’m not particularly liking what I’m seeing here’.

“I don’t particularly see a future where I will have success here.”

Fast forward to another tumultuous week in the club’s history and opinion is divided on this famous football club at the end of its 150th year.

A raft of Essendon players have left the club because of its miserable state.

Is it a complete circus, or a shrewd masterstroke to ruthlessly cast aside senior coach Ben Rutten for premiership mastermind Alastair Clarkson and his good mate Todd Viney?

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Star midfielder Zach Merrett said Tuesday night he was unhappy the club was back in crisis mode.

Can you blame him?

“I copped a bit of criticism probably last year for holding out a contract about direction of the club and to be sitting here in a bit of a mess 12 months later is a bit disappointing,” Merrett said on AFL 360.

“But also I’ve committed long-term to the club and I’m really keen and hopeful that in the next two, three, four, five months that they get really clear on what they want to achieve and how we’re going to achieve it and I’ll fall into line massively on that path.”

Enduring hardship has become a common theme for Zach Merrett at Essendon. Picture: Getty Images

To Saad’s point two years ago, former Collingwood senior coach Nathan Buckley said Essendon “have been a broken club for the most part of the last decade” and was adamant the process this week was not “honourable”.

How much of that part would appeal to Clarkson? Is this a powerful club cherry ripe to relaunch or a rabble?

Books have already been written about Essendon and the extraordinary events since the 2012 injections regimen which echoed around the globe when the 2016 bans were handed out.

But the happenings of the past 72 hours would surely make for another compelling chapter as the club went all-out for a new coach, before it had made the call to remove its current one.

It was a massive vote of no confidence in Rutten. He’s Xavier Campbell’s man.

Sunday’s loss to Port Adelaide was a horrific performance from a team which looked like it had checked out. The white flag went up and the club knew it.

The John Worsfold-Ben Rutten succession plan was meant to be the answer for the Bombers. Picture: AFL Photos/Getty Images

Essendon has long maintained under John Worsfold and Rutten the club is on a journey, prepared to be patient, and invested in young talent.

But everyone has a breaking point.

And how many more years without a finals win can the long-suffering supporter base put up with?

The Bombers looked like a genuine flag contender in 2013 as they racked up 13 wins from 16 games, and then spiralled as the supplements saga and injury crisis took hold.

Hird was banned, welcomed back and then resigned, and Jobe Watson lost his Brownlow Medal.

The club found half a team from the state leagues.

But each time the club has put a plan together to rebound, and rebuild, the bottom of the bag seems to fall out.

It happened when Fantasia, Saad and Daniher left, leading to the reset in the following year’s draft. The finals breakthrough in 2021 was proof, it seemed, of the new direction.

They had talent and traction, and were better off without Daniher and Co. anyway, we all said.

Who didn’t love the sight of Archie Perkins, Nik Cox, Sam Durham and Peter Wright clunking marks? Add Zach Reid, Jye Caldwell, Jake Kelly and Darcy Parish, and this can’t be about the cattle. Zach Reid is coming along. Nic Martin was a super find. The midfield is quality.

It can’t be about talent at Essendon. It’s there.

And, if there were doubts this year after another slow start, wins over Sydney and a half-strength Brisbane Lions away seemed to put everyone at ease, if only momentarily.

But, following terrible back-to-back losses, the alarm bells rang once more, and the patience and faith the club has long maintained it had, has gone out the window in favour of a new coach.

Another new set up could be on the way in, just like it had when Neil Craig and Robb Kerr came in, when Mark Thompson took over, and when the club poached Dan Richardson, and then Josh Mahoney.

What must Saad and Daniher, in particular, be thinking watching all this play out from afar this week? Paddy Ryder, Jake Melksham and Michael Hibberd also left, and remain on active lists.

What’s next for staunch Bomber Dyson Heppell? Picture: Getty Images

Captain Dyson Heppell has seen it all in his time at Essendon but even this latest drama must be confounding for a man whose future, as skipper, is also yet to be finalised.

He stood by the club in its darkest hour, and in the past month has been considering whether to stay or go to Gold Coast.

Rutten said the situation and speculation around Clarkson was “not ideal” as he entered the club on Tuesday morning, knowing the board was clearly undermining him with their will-we-or-won’t-we get ‘Clarko’ crisis talks.

Tough spot to be in. Something Essendon knows well.

Originally published as Jay Clark: A look at the disastrous decade that led to Essendon’s latest turmoil