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ESSENDON Football Club chairman Paul Little and coach James Hird addressed the media this afternoon to respond to the charges levelled against them by the AFL in the Statement of Grounds released earlier this afternoon.
And they both came out firing denying all the charges and accusing the AFL and AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou of “trial by media”.
Little began the Bombers’ counter attack to the AFL claims by saying that ”We do not consider the statement of grounds justified by the evidience”.
In his own understated way, Little was emphatic in his statements addressing the allegation that the club is guilty of the drug accusations by saying that ”I cannot and will not accept that point of view”.
Here is Little’s full statement:
The AFL has this afternoon, against their initial undertaking, released the Statement of Grounds in support of the charge issued against the Essendon Football Club. We do not consider the Statement of Grounds supporting the charge is justified by the evidence gathered during the investigation. It makes assertions that are simply not supported by the evidence.
The timing of the release is no coincidence – the release follows last night’s revelation that the AFL has known since February of this year, that one of the substances, at the very heart of this matter AOD9604, was not a banned substance.
That the AFL has known this for six months but let questions hang over the heads of our club, and most unforgivably our players, is reprehensible. This, being exposed by an AFL insider, has prompted this latest PR attack on the Club and the individuals concerned.
The Club had sought to prevent these charges being released for one very good reason – we believe a number of the allegations to be outrageous, totally without foundation or substantiation, specifically the assertion that the players were administered prohibited substances.This is severely damaging to the reputations of those charged.
The Club has always maintained that we did not deliberately set out to run a supplement program, that involved prohibited substances being given to players. Indeed, we do not accept that prohibited substances were so administered.
In the AFL’s own words “neither Essendon nor Hird, Reid, Corcoran, Thompson…set out to implement a supplements program that would result in players being administered WADA prohibited or harmful substances.”
ASADA, in its Interim Report did not make any positive findings that individual players were injected with specified prohibited substances.
We have always maintained that AOD9604 was not a prohibited substance in 2011 and 2012, and advice of professional experts support this.
Since receiving these charges a little over a week ago, I have personally been in constant dialogue with the AFL, in which both parties have attempted to:
- have the charges re-worded to better reflect actual events and the evidence collated; and
- reach common ground in relation to possible sanctions should the Club plead guilty to any of the charges.
Clearly, the AFL was aware of the failings of its original charge sheet.The revised ‘draft’ charge sheet provided to me by the AFL earlier this week has been posted on our website. A cursory comparison of this document against that released by the AFL today, underscores my contention that the original charges were designed to do little more than score media headlines and ultimately intimidate us.
This belligerent attitude has carried through to discussions on potential sanctions.
As I have said before, the Club recognises that it had shortcomings in governance and management practices in late 2011 and 2012. Already we have changed many things within the Club to avoid a repeat of this, and we understand that we will have to accept a penalty from the AFL for these shortcomings.
However, we maintain our belief that no player was administered either harmful or prohibited substances, and assert, there is insufficient evidence upon which any such allegation should have been made.
Certainly, the interim ASADA report provided no proof to the contrary and in a letter dated 2 August 2013 to AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou, ASADA CEO Aurora Andruska reinforced this view.
The AFL is determined to punish the Essendon Football Club – and four individuals personally – as though we were drug cheats.
As Chairman of this football club – and with the unanimous backing of our Board – and based on the evidence I cannot and will not – accept that. Like all football fans, we want this matter resolved.
I call on Commission Chairman Mike Fitzpatrick to step in and take over this process as I along with a significant percentage of the football public have lost total confidence in the AFL Executive to handle this matter.
A determined Hird followed Little and continued the attack making a point of what he believed to be his shabby treatment at the hands of the AFL.
Here is Hird’s full statement:
The AFL today continued its trial by media of me with the release of the charges against the Essendon Football Club.
My lawyers only received notification by the AFL’s lawyers of the release of the Essendon Football Club charges minutes before they were made public. Courtesy would dictate that the AFL would have given adequate notification of the release of the charges so I could prepare.
Further the release by the AFL of a letter by Dr Bruce Reid to me that formed part of the confidential ASADA investigation is in breach of due process.
The letter, released in isolation, is designed to damage my reputation.
This continues the abuse of process by the AFL by using the media to prosecute a case it seems unwilling to actually prosecute in a tribunal.
My lawyers wrote to the AFL last week seeking certain undertakings, particulars of the charges, and asked the AFL what the basis of their case was, ie who it’s witnesses were and what they were going to say in respect of the charges so that I could properly prepare my case.
The AFL is yet to respond to these requests which has made delay of the hearing inevitable.
These charges are denied and will be vigorously contested once the AFL actually provides due process.
The announcement by ambush confirms that the AFL is running an agenda which continues to call into question its impartiality.
My position is the same today as what it was yesterday and in previous weeks. That is:
1. I will contest the charges;
2. Mr Demetriou and the AFL should recuse themselves from any hearing of this case because of the conflict of interest that has been created by the AFL’s involvement in the process; and
3. There should be a public hearing conducted transparently by an independent arbiter.
It is critical to note that the ASADA report is interim; that no player infractions have been issued and the AFL and ASADA may be in breach of the law with the use of the interim report as a basis for the charges that have been laid.
In this frenzy of releases and press conferences today, the AFL remains silent about its knowledge since February 2013 of AOD9604 not being a banned substance, the major issue in this saga.
Throughout the course of this exercise I have been denied natural justice and today’s ambush is just another example of that.
More to come…