‘Most overpaid player in football’: Cornes tears Bombers to shreds

Kane Cornes has turned the flamethrower on Essendon’s playing list, brutally calling out one of the club’s big name players.

Essendon’s woeful start to the 2025 season has seen not only the playing group come under heavy fire, now the front office is drawing attention.

After falling to Hawthorn by 26 points in round 1, the Bombers were torn apart to the tune of 61 points against a rampant Adelaide outfit in round 2.

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It has left the finals starved club sitting in third last place on the ladder with no signs they’ll be turning around their fortune anytime soon.

The club has been called out over their defensive issues, but on Monday night Kane Cornes was turning his attention onto the club’s decision makers.

Cornes took a flamethrower to the long-term deals handed out by the club as he mercilessly ran the rule over a handful of stars who were failing to provide a return on the investment.

“The one place you don’t want to be in footy is thinking you’re closer than you actually are,” Nick Riewoldt said on Channel 7’s The Agenda Setters.

Cornes responded: “I think they know now, they didn’t when they did these deals.

Cornes dubbed McKay the most overpaid player in the game. (Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

“What they’ve invested in is a group of players who are letting them down significantly and they’ve invested heavily in this crop of players.

“There’s the contracts of the players they’ve invested in, if you line up that with their performance … (Andrew) McGrath you mentioned, (Ben) McKay is the most overpaid player in football.

“Darcy Parish just does not play. I can’t understand why they gave him a seven-year deal. And Ridley they gave three on top of three and he doesn’t play either.

“When that’s your core influential group of players and they either don’t play or they perform poorly then you’re in all sorts of trouble.”

Parish played 12 games in 2024 and hasn’t played in 2025. (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

Ridley played only 9 games last season. (Photo by Daniel Pockett/Getty Images)

McKay joined the Bombers following the 2023 AFL season when he put pen to paper on a six-year deal worth a reported $850,000 per season.

The deal was heavily front-ended which meant McKay was paid a staggering seven-figure wage in his first year with the club.

Parish inked a six-year deal with the Bombers, tying him to the club until the end of the 2029 season.

Since he signed the long-term extension he has only pulled on the red sash 12 times and has yet to feature in 2025.

Ridley was already tied to the club until 2026 when he signed a three-year extension on top of the deal.

Since the beginning of last season, Ridley has only taken to the field in a total of 10 games for the Bombers.

The long-term deals have not paid off for the Bombers. (Photo by Josh Chadwick/AFL Photos/via Getty Images)

With serious questions hanging over the club, AFL 360 host Gerard Whateley exposed the damning state of the list.

“It’s not all talent for talent, but that equation gave you the issues around the list,” Whateley told AFL 360.

“So this is layered: There’s there here-and-now and then there’s the overall, which I think Essendon understands more than anybody else.

“And these are well-warned conversations. This is the price of trading away three years’ worth of draft picks and then missing with the high picks that have come thereafter. There are players that are still toiling away and trying, but they’re not going to live up to the lofty billing.

“When you have those picks inside 10, you have to hit. This is the Matt Rosa document from October last year, which is why the coach’s contract was brought into line. There’s a three-year project to amass talent. They have a major talent deficit, which can only be addressed through high-end draft picks.”

Asked where the Bombers’ sat now, Whateley said: “They’re in full-blow rebuild … The toughest years are now … I don’t think we were adequately braced for that.”

Co-host Garry Lyon added: “There’s some Essendon fans on the couch sitting there that wouldn’t like hearing that too much.”

The Bombers will aim to secure their first win of the 2025 season when they take on Port Adelaide on Thursday night at Marvel Stadium.

Originally published as ‘Most overpaid player in football’: Cornes tears Bombers to shreds