Blues review: New Carlton president Luke Sayers to release summary of findings to members
New Carlton president Luke Sayers has taken a step toward appeasing the Blues’ 80,000 members, revealing they will get a first look at a summary of the club’s review.
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Carlton’s 81,302 members will receive a summary of the club’s external review before new president Luke Sayers goes public with any fallout of the findings.
Sayers wrote to Blues fans as he officially stepped into the chair on Wednesday, replacing Mark LoGiudice who occupied the position for eight years.
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Sayers – a club director since 2012 – commissioned the review of the football department, which saw Geoff Walsh, Matthew Pavlich and Graham Lowe given full access to players, coaches and staff mid-season.
Coach David Teague said last week it had led to a psychologically unsafe workplace.
“On 8 June, we commenced an independent review of our football department,” Sayers said in his letter to the club’s faithful.
“This review was commissioned on the basis that as a football club, we are not satisfied with our on-field performance and we owe it to our members and supporters to conduct a process to ensure the necessary improvements are made.
“The independent, external panel last week provided an update to me, to the board and to CEO Cain Liddle.
“This process is now reaching its final stages and I assure you we will not be making any public comment until we have directly communicated with you, our members.
“This will include providing you with the summarised findings of the review that I know members have a deep and justified interest in.”
Blues urged to release review before deciding Teague future
Carlton board challenger Vince Loccisano has urged new Blues boss Luke Sayers to release the recommendations of the external football department review before making a call on coach David Teague.
Loccisano said Sayers, 52, had been a nine-year member of a Carlton board with a culture of sacking coaches.
“They have appointed and sacked coaches Ratten, Malthouse, Bolton and possibly now Teague without proper process, without member consultation and without accountability,” Loccisano said.
“Members are fed up and have taken to social media to express themselves about how
the Carlton Football Club has been stifled by this board’s toxic culture.
“Just look at the hundreds of angry comments on the official Carlton Facebook page last night in response to the parting message from departing president, Mark LoGiudice.
“The members are justifiably angry and they’re hurting.
“I challenge Luke Sayers to show us the recommendations of the external review. I
say to him, ‘Show us the basis for your thorough process and decision-making around
Teague and the potential next coach. Show us that it’s not just the same disastrous lack
of accountability and arrogant lack of process that we’ve seen for the last 10 years of
this board’.
“Luke Sayers commissioned the review and implemented it. It’s his report. The Carlton members paid for it, and they have a right to at least see the recommendations, so we understand how the process works.
“This is particularly important given Chris Judd hasn’t been active on the board now for a very long time, so there is no football director presiding over how the recommendations in this report are implemented.
“This is absurd and a clear indication of why so many poor football appointments have been made over the past decade.”
Loccisano, a Blues life member and past president of the powerful “Carltonians” coterie group, is pushing for the staging of an extraordinary general meeting and a spill of the board.
His group, going by the name “Carlton Now – Our Club, Our Future”, has expressed grievances about a series of proposed changes to the club’s constitution.
The changes include an increase in the number of signatures needed to force an EGM from 100 eligible voting members to five per cent of the total pool, the waiving of a requirement for a Blues director to have been a club member for at least two years before joining the board and a reduction in the annual rotation of club directors seeking re-election from three down to two.
“We need to see a new culture at board level at Carlton,” Loccisano said.
“A ‘football-first’ approach in which members are treated respectfully and are fully informed about how and why crucial decisions are made, particularly around appointments.
“Clearly these decisions which Luke Sayers has been instrumental in over the past nine
years have failed. And a culture that does not support the coach and back him in,
cannot hope for on-field success.
“This is not the way that will see us playing finals series and winning premierships. We need a new positive, winning culture.”
Sayers, a former PWC Australia CEO joined the board in September 2012, just weeks after the sacking of Ratten.
He was heavily-endorsed this week by billionaire club powerbroker Bruce Mathieson, whose nephew Craig has sat on the board since October 2012.
Carlton clean-out: Blues begin contract calls on big names
The clean out in Carlton has started to take hold with big man Levi Casboult joining Eddie Betts and Marc Murphy heading into retirement.
The three players have all announced that they will not be going on next year, just days after the Blues board were handed an external review into the struggling club’s football department.
Club president Mark LoGiudice also announced he was quitting his post this week, and handing the reins to incoming president Luke Sayers earlier than expected.
“The opportunity to call Carlton home and live out my boyhood dream over the past 12 years has been incredible,” Casboult said.
“To be departing the club with life membership and after reaching the 150-game milestone earlier this year, is something I am incredibly proud of and am honoured to have been able to achieve.
“So many people at this football club have shown faith in me over the course of my career and I am extremely grateful for the support I have received; both internally from a staffing and player point of view, and externally from my family, friends and all Carlton members and supporters.”
Casboult kicked a career-most 34 goals to lead the Blues’ tally in 2017, and finished fifth in the club’s best and fairest two years ago after playing in the backline and the ruck.
The Carlton review is also expected to determine in coming days the future of David Teague and the Carlton coaching department.
It is believed Teague won’t coach next year, opening the way for the club to approach experienced leaders such as Ross Lyon and Alastair Clarkson.
New Blues president’s billion-dollar backing
New Carlton president Luke Sayers has been given the seal of approval by billionaire club powerbroker Bruce Mathieson.
Sayers, 52, replaced Mark LoGiudice at the helm of the embattled Blues on Monday ahead of a major off-field shake-up.
Mathieson, a former Carlton director who has gifted hundreds of money-spinning poker machines to the club, said Sayers was the right man to take charge at Princes Park.
“I honestly believe that Mr Sayers will do a brilliant job,” Mathieson said.
“He will be very, very good. He’s well thought of in the business community, very smart and will do the job.”
Mathieson, 77, said outgoing president Mark LoGiudice also deserved high praise for turning around the club’s dire financial situation.
“I want it said that under the circumstances of what Mark LoGiudice worked under, he did an unbelievable job for Carlton,” Mathieson said.
The influential pokies king, whose nephew Craig serves on the Blues board, said LoGiudice had inherited a club plagued by “financial stress and problems” when he replaced Stephen Kernahan as president in June 2014.
“That should never be forgotten. Everything is easy when you’ve got money and you’ve got things going your way, but when it’s tough that’s when you know someone has done a good job,” he said.
“People just don’t realise (how bad it was). We had nothing. How Mark turned that around was nothing short of brilliant.
“It’s time now. Mark has done his job and done it wonderfully well, under the circumstances of bringing the club back to where it now can go forward. We couldn’t go forward before … we had nothing … because it was just so badly ran.
“He (LoGiudice) has cleared the decks and given Luke a wonderful base to work from.”
Carlton is seeking approval from members to alter the club’s constitution to give Sayers extra time to serve as president.
The former PWC Australia CEO joined the Carlton board in September 2012, weeks after the sacking of coach Brett Ratten.
The Blues have since hired and fired senior coaches Mick Malthouse and Brendon Bolton, and are set to part ways with current coach David Teague
Why top Blue is stepping down early
Mark LoGiudice has officially handed over his role to president elect Luke Sayers as the club prepares to deliver its review findings next week.
The Herald Sun revealed on Monday Sayers took over the reins of the club a week ahead of the final home-and-away clash of the year.
Long-time board member Sayers is keen to officially be the club’s president when the club makes a decision on coach David Teague in the next week.
The club must endure another turbulent week of speculation, with Eddie Betts to retire as early as Tuesday.
He is set to go out as one of the AFL’s great champions but that press conference is not expected to take place on Monday.
LoGiudice had flagged the orderly handover to Sayers early in the year.
Sayers commissioned the external review and has been working with chief executive Cain Liddle on the findings since the board received the report last Thursday.
Sayers is keen to own that report and the decisions that will flow from it, which will include considerable changes across the football department.
Sayers is a strong admirer of Ross Lyon, with the former St Kilda and Fremantle coach saying on Sunday he was now available to become a senior coach.
The club’s horror loss to Port Adelaide, which included 19 straight goals, was another hit for coach Teague.
But it remains to be seen whether he has already been informed that he will not coach in 2022 or will have to wait until post Round 23.
LoGiudice confirmed the decision on Monday, saying he had full trust in Sayers.
“As communicated to you earlier this year, this season is to be my last as president of the Carlton Football Club, with my tenure officially concluding this week, whereby I will formally complete my extensive handover to incoming president, Luke Sayers.
“I have full trust and confidence that Luke as president, and the Board of Directors, will continue the work of growing the entire football club, delivering on-field success for all our teams and importantly serving you, and all our members.
“Stability and managed succession are still the keys to the future success of this football club.
“To this point, the club has undertaken a review of the football department with the key focus on our AFL team.
“The independent, external panel last week provided an update to incoming president Luke Sayers and the board. This update was part of the review process which remains ongoing and any further updates will be communicated to members in due course.”
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