Robbo on Collingwood struggles: Fan frustration as Pies at lowest ebb in 20 years

Collingwood president Mark Korda has spoken about the latest upheaval at the club and revealed he has spoken to the man who might try to take his job.

Collingwood president Mark Korda has revealed he has met would-be challenger Jeff Browne, but says now is not the time for a “coup”.

As the Magpies stumble from crisis to crisis, Korda, who formally replaced Eddie McGuire as president last month, said a move to take over the club by a Browne ticket was “not in the best interests of the Collingwood Football Club”.

Korda said the board was elected by the members and he had no intention of standing down.

He said he did not ask Browne for a commitment not to challenge him, but said a scheduled board election next season was the “right time to address that issue”.

“I met with Jeff Browne and we talked broadly about the Collingwood Football Club,” Korda told 3AW’s Neil Mitchell.

“I think he understands coups aren’t in the best interest of football clubs, either.

Watch the 2021 Toyota AFL Premiership Season. Every match of every round Live on Kayo. New to Kayo? Try 14-Days Free Now >

Collingwood president Mark Korda took over the role after Eddie McGuire quit.

“What will happen, Neil, is ... there are three directors up for re-election at the end of this season and any member who wants to come on the board could stand for re-election. I think that’s an appropriate process and that’s what our constitution allows for.

“We’ve got a fully elected board by the members ... we need to govern the club in accordance with proper process and protocol.

“I’ve had the discussion with Eddie, Eddie’s on the record, coups aren’t good for football clubs.”

Collingwood’s billionaire vice president Alex Waislitz quit the board on Tuesday night. He is the second director to leave the club in three months after Eddie McGuire resigned as president in February.

Waislitz will be replaced, effective immediately, by former professional road cyclist Dr Bridie O’Donnell.

Korda said an executive search was conducted to find the new board members, and of about 90 candidates, Browne wasn’t one of them because he’d left his run too late.

He disputed suggestions by club legend Tony Shaw that the club should wait to make a call on Buckley until the board dispute was resolved.

Korda said footy boss Graham Wright was conducting a full review of the footy department.

“We made it very clear at the beginning of the season that we would make a call on Nathan’s tenure in the back half of the season, everyone, including Nathan, remains committed to that timetable,” Korda said.

“We now have a full complement of seven directors that have been through an extensive vetting process, we now have a full board and that board elected me as president and we will govern the club and make decisions in the best interests of the Collingwood Football Club.”

Korda said he hadn’t spoken to McGuire about Browne’s potential board challenge, but he said McGuire was on record as saying “you should all get behind Mark Korda”.

Korda described his presidency as a “transition from the past to the future”.

He added the club had reached out to Heritier Lumumba “ six or seven times” .

ROBBO: GET READY FOR PIES BOARD EXPLOSION

— Mark Robinson

The forgotten people in this Collingwood mess are the fans.

They are bewildered and frustrated by the performances on the field and are being kept in the dark off it, as a group of people prepares to take over the joint.

They’ve heard nothing from presidential wannabe Jeff Browne, while his great mate, former president Eddie McGuire, refuses to pass any comment on the goings on at the club.

McGuire knows everything and while he’s enthusiastic to speak about every other subject in football, he’s mum on the Pies.

All the while, fans sit and wait and hope and cry as their football club wallows in its lowest ebb in two decades.

Make no mistake a boardroom explosion looms.

The fans will have no say about what happens, as was the case for two decades under McGuire.

The current board, led by Mark Korda, is being slaughtered in the PR stakes. Typhoon Browne is raging with media coverage, while Korda and Co are quiet. Too quiet.

Korda did not return a call from the Herald Sun on Monday.

Fans deserve more from the boss. Something. Anything.

No more dribble about finals being the plan. The rules have changed.

Politics abound while losses accumulate and the ladder is not a lie. The team doesn’t have an identity and, it can be argued, neither does the new president.

Fans deserve clarity and direction — and a say.

Collingwood fans are in the dark over backroom battles. Picture: Getty Images

They might not want Korda as president because he was vice president to McGuire for a decade and then, at the end, was seen as helping to tip Eddie out.

Perhaps they see Korda and McGuire as the same. Perhaps Korda needs to be his own man and stand up and present his vision in the post-McGuire era, so as not to be seen as a McGuire-era lacky.

Because right now, fans are asking: Who is Mark Korda?

And the fans might not want Browne either. He’s Eddie’s mate and he is already an established figure in the AFL boys’ club. Same again?

Indeed, they might want a big broom and everyone can go.

True, some fans probably think McGuire was white-anted by his former mates at Collingwood, while others could be excused for thinking McGuire’s helping to marshall Browne’s ticket. Remember, McGuire is a political animal.

It’s a massive, ugly mess.

And then there’s Bucks.

Fan want to believe in Nathan Buckley, while others have had enough.

What’s next for Nathan Buckley? Picture: AFL Photos/Getty Images

He said after the loss to the Swans: “We showed that we had the right plan and the right attitude, and I thought our workrate was consistent throughout the game, we just dropped away with the skill execution.”

The Pies kicked one goal in three quarters.

It was a dour encounter, sometimes too hard to watch, and if that’s the plan, then good luck enticing fans to matches.

The “skill execution’’ is because they don’t have enough talent. They used to. Then poor TPP management and a horrid list cull helped scuttle the talent.

The team that lost at the weekend lacked pizzazz.

After watching North Melbourne in Launceston and the Pies in Sydney, you could mount an argument that the Kangas are closer to being a finals threat.

Buckley is trying to distance himself from the board upheaval.

Asked after the game if the constant discussions, which included a Nine Newspaper’s article on the day, could distract him or his team, Buckley said: “It’s so much not a distraction, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He would know, of course, that his manager Craig Kelly endorsed Browne as president in a Herald Sun article on April 21.

A disappointed Collingwood walks off the MCG after losing to the Gold Coast in Round 7. Picture: Michael Klein

MORE NEWS

JEFF BROWNE’S BEHIND-THE-SCENES CAMPAIGN TO SEIZE CONTROL

THE GAPING HOLE THREATENING TO SWALLOW COLLINGWOOD

THE TACKLE: NO EXCUSE FOR BLUES’ BROKEN DEFENCE

On available evidence, Buckley’s in no man’s land.

He doesn’t know if the incumbents want him or if Browne wants him.

Whether the incumbents have clandestinely put out feelers for a replacement or if Browne has eyes on a Alastair Clarkson or Ross Lyon or Sam Mitchell

There’s the possibility the incumbents want to keep Buckley.

But surely if Browne takes over, his mob wants to make the decision on the coach and not inherit a decision.

Of course, the current board can do what it wants. They are in control. And the Browne ticket means diddly squat until it launches a challenge.

For what it’s worth, if the current board sees Buckley as its coach, it should abandon the post-bye plan and appoint him as soon as possible and get on with the business of appeasing and finding sponsors, which is another club issue.

And do it before Browne makes an official play.

If it doesn’t want Buckley, it might as well cut him loose because he, like the fans, deserves clarity and direction.

Clearly, at 2-7 and with Port Adelaide (MCG), Geelong (MCG), Adelaide (Adelaide Oval) and Melbourne (MCG) to come, it’s a tinderbox at Collingwood.