Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley compares Adam Treloar’s exit to new Hawk Tom Phillips
Nathan Buckley hasn’t spoken to Adam Treloar since his move and he says the star midfielder handled his Magpies exit very differently to Tom Phillips.
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Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley has revealed he hasn’t spoken to Adam Treloar since the former Magpies midfielder was forced out of the club during last year’s trade period.
Treloar found a new home at the Western Bulldogs but voiced his disappointment after the move and said he felt “hurt” after Buckley told him “in no uncertain way” that Collingwood teammates did not want him at the club.
Buckley has denied telling Treloar such words, but has contrasted how Treloar handled his move with that of fellow Magpie Tom Phillips, who was traded to Hawthorn to also relieve Collingwood’s salary cap pressure.
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Ahead of what looms as a blockbuster Round 1 clash between Collingwood and the Western Bulldogs on March 19, Buckley said Treloar had viewed his move as “personal” while Phillips knew his trade was a “professional” decision.
“(Phillips) came down and watched our praccy match a couple of weeks ago and he looks like he’s going really well, and I suppose there’s a bit of contrast in the reality of professional existence,” Buckley said.
“We believe, and I believe, I show genuine love and care for our people and we really challenge the professional. And sometimes when there’s professional decisions that need to be made, it’s hard to separate the personal side of it. I’ve reached out to ‘Ads’ (Treloar) a couple of times and we haven’t connected.
“We’ll let Round 1 come and go. I hope he does really well. He’s a great guy, he’s a very talented footballer and I do wish him all the best and I look forward to re-establishing the relationship in some form.”
Buckley said the “very same conversations” that happened with Treloar had also happened with Tom Phillips, who had handled his situation “a whole lot differently” and saw it wasn’t a personal decision but rather a professional decision.
“That’s not to say that Ads was wrong and Flip was right, or that you don’t treat people as individuals, but for me that shows the contrasts,” Buckley told the AFL website.
“You can have the same conversations with two different people around exactly the same circumstances and there’s going to be two different responses. That’s Ads’ experience and that’s Tom’s experience.”
Buckley said the Magpies now felt like they had the money to be “in that window” to land a star player in this year’s trade and free agency period.
“If we find someone that we feel is going to really make a difference for us we’d be negligent in our duties not to follow it through,” Buckley said.
Bucks’ biggest regret over Lumumba press conference
Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley says he has made time for “personal reflection” since the release of the Magpies ‘Do Better’ racism report and regrets being “dismissive” of genuine issues that were raised by former player Heritier Lumumba.
Speaking for the first time since the bombshell report was revealed by the Herald Sun last month, Buckley said that there was “a lot of listening that needs to take place” after some “traumatic moments” in the club’s recent history.
Revealing that Collingwood had adopted all 18 recommendations of the report, Buckley said he believed the club had already taken “pretty good strides” forward in the area in recent years but could always do better.
Buckley said he had not attempted to contact Lumumba again since the release of the report which found “systemic racism” at the club.
However, entering his 10th season at the helm he said he had reflected on how he personally handled the situation, including in a post-game press conference in 2017.
“There was a press conference I gave in 2017 when Heritier’s documentary came out,” Buckley told the AFL website.
“I wasn’t able to separate myself from the personal connection and the potential feeling of not having been able to have done enough in that circumstance to lift myself out of that to see the bigger picture which is that what Heritier’s talking about, what Leon (Davis) is talking about, what Andrew (Krakouer) has spoken about, is their experience. Where they want to be and what we want the place to be – we’re united in that.
“We don’t want people to ever feel like they’re diminished or vilified or seen as less than in our environment. If that is their experience then it needs to be acknowledged and for that I think the club has said it apologises unreservedly and obviously I have been a part of this club for a long time so I don’t like the fact that people have felt that way and I’ve got to – we’ve all got to – listen and learn more to the experiences and acknowledge them rather than dismissing them.”
While Buckley did not specify which press conference he was referring to, Lumumba has recently criticised him on social media over an August, 2017 press conference.
In that, Buckley described it as “sad” that Lumumba was so scathing in his criticism of Collingwood and he hoped that Lumumba was “doing well and that he can still see the positives of his experience as an AFL footballer”.
“It was dismissive and I needed to be better than that,” Buckley said.
“When you reflect on that you say, ‘OK, how can we do this better?’ Because you’ve got to be aware and conscious of it, and there’s a lot of listening and learning that needs to take place from the people that have felt for a long time that they don’t have a voice.
“Our internal environment has improved but clearly there‘s still work to do and as I said, it’s not about my experience, it’s not about anyone’s experience from a white privileged background, it’s actually about hearing the experiences of people who feel like they’re not being honoured the way they should be.”
Buckley said he was unaware of the contents of the ‘Do Better’ report until it reached the media in February, but said Collingwood had been an extension of a wider society which also needs to do better.
“We know that we’re not separate of the rest of the football industry and we’re definitely not separate of the rest of Australia or the rest of the world,” he said.
“So the issues that we’re dealing with are very real, not just for us but for everyone. I think it was well overdue for us to acknowledge this and acknowledge the experiences of some of the people in our environment.”
Buckley refused to say whether Eddie McGuire’s decision to step down as Collingwood president last month was the right one or not, but hailed his legacy at the club.
“Over 23 years … there’s so much good that he has done and there’s so much of a positive influence he’s had on the footy club,” Buckley said of McGuire.
“In the history books, he’ll stand the test of time, there’s no doubt. But Ed made that decision because he felt it was time for him and he thought it was time for the football club. Yes, we will focus on the events of the moment or the day and I think they are real. But the fact is everyone’s time comes and Ed felt it was time for him to move on. He’s committed a lot of himself for a long time and the club has been a beneficiary of that for a long period.”
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