Nick's Collingwood Bulletin Board

And now with Hird suing ASADA this whole farce has turned into a joke!

Those saying that Essendon will need to be given draft picks if, in the unlikely event, 20+ players are suspended for 6 months to 2 years (it won't be 4). They won't. If they suffer mass suspensions they'll be banned from the comp. ASADA won't allow a team with a mass doping violation to take the field.

And, in this circumstance, there is no way they should receive any compensation on their return. That's like taking draft picks away from Adelaide for their salary cap infringement and then compensating them the next year. Won't happen.

I'd say they get given PSD picks to fill out their list and let them play. With TV rights etc, you can't just remove the team.

No, why should they be given PSD picks?

What's wrong with their reserves side?

I just hope ASADA won't lose in the courts!

Has anyone taken on WADA & can they over rule any decision should it not be satisfied with the outcome?

ANNODAM wrote:No, why should they be given PSD picks?

What's wrong with their reserves side?

I just hope ASADA won't lose in the courts!

Has anyone taken on WADA & can they over rule any decision should it not be satisfied with the outcome?

ASADA won't lose, that's why it's taken so long, water tight case.

The bummers are just trying to make this last long enough the good players who are about to be gone, play longer.

Should not get special assistance. Melbourne and Carlscum been laying their reserves teams for years. **** em

ASADA/WADA will lose if the Federal court rules that all the evidence collected in the 'joint' investigation is inadmissible. They won't be able to obtain any new evidence.

They took their time for a reason, this is not the first National Comp WADA has tackled!

The irony of this whole mess is that Essendon didn't need to inject their players given the depth of young talent they had on their list. If they'd just been patient and develop them correctly in all likelihood they'd be in top 4 right now and a legitimate contender for the flag.
As it stands at the moment they may very well not see the inside of the top 8 for the next decade.

Wokko wrote:I'd say they get given PSD picks to fill out their list and let them play. With TV rights etc, you can't just remove the team.

They won't have a choice. The team will be banned if there are mass player and/or coaching suspensions.

WADA have the power to deregister any team which has a significant portion of the playing list banned

Flashman wrote:When Carlton were busted they should have investigated actually how far back it went and if was going on back in 1995 (which you'd have to think it was) then they should have been stripped of the premiership ala Melbourne Storm along with the draft penalties and fine.

Otherwise they did get away with cheating.

I have very credible evidence to suggest their cheating goes back to 1864 and all premierships in vfa and VFL may be stripped. Stay tuned...

Download and read the wada code which all players are bound by and u wil quickly find they r so screwed, most players will cop 2 years.

Big T wrote:WADA have the power to deregister any team which has a significant portion of the playing list banned

And this is what ps me off over this whole thing. If there are mass bannings, let's say 15 or more players, the AFL, around the world, will have a similar reputation to the Tour de France. Not the same profile of course, but it will be known, and the league will be mentioned alongside competitions like the MLB. I don't take any delight in seeing the Bombers suffer, because of what it means for our game. I'd have much preferred that they were able to prove complete innocence, unfortunately that no longer seems likely.

In the end, if suspensions are handed down, I'd expect less than 10 and it may even be significantly less. If I remember rightly, only 11 players admitted to taking any form of Thymosin, so ASADA may end up only targeting them and possibly a subset of those against whom their evidence is strongest.

Whatever the case, if suspensions go ahead, any suspensions, blackest day in Australian sport would not be an exaggeration. Particularly as suspensions look very likely in the NRL (now that, I can take some delight in ).

This is the reason why I always felt the punishments handed down to Essendon were lenient. "Poor governance" was the spin term used to make their transgressions seem less serious, like maybe they'd forgotten to sign a few forms. This spin may have worked on Essendon fans, but the true story is that it has been proven and admitted by Essendon that they allowed a major injection programme to continue with little oversight and, they say, no documentation. That is incredibly serious.

And now we are seeing the results of it. With Essendon facing a drugs claim that they have no way of defending. The AFL should have had better rules and oversight in place itself, but there's no denying that Essendon, whether or not performance enhancing drugs were taken, did not live up to their duty of care to their players and have left them with no defense against serious allegations. This is why they're clinging to their desperate court challenge against the legality of the investigation, because in a tribunal where they need to put forward their side of what happened, they don't have a leg to stand on, and it's all their own fault, not the AFL, not ASADA, not Demetriou, Essendon and only Essendon.

It's staggering to me that James Hird is still the coach in waiting at Essendon.

Staggering.

swoop42 wrote:It's staggering to me that James Hird is still the coach in waiting at Essendon.

Staggering.

Tell me about it.

Imagine the same issue under bucks at Collingwood. He would be gonesky long ago as would Eddie and co.

Essendon have immense cultural problems, and now the "protect our boys, they are the victims, we didn't do anything wrong" mantra will mean an organisation in which people feel like scapegoats will exist for a long time, which always results in no accountability and certain failure. They need a complete clean out.