Paul Gardner's response

[Footynut 302]

I just fail to understand anyone could be so self serving as Paul Gardner. He either hates the club or couldnt get over that he was ousted and he feels the need to sink the boots in to make himself feel better.

A true MFC person wouldn't put their nose in and fuel the fire.

Paul you are nothing but an arrogant man who is sour and only demonstrating you care more about yourself than the club. Please never associate with the MFC again. We don't need people like you. You are a disgrace to the MFC.

[Hannibal 5,814]

A true MFC person wouldn't put their nose in and fuel the fire.

I beg to differ. Melbourne has the reputation for being the most factionalised club in the AFL for good reason.

Jim Stynes performed a minor miracle when he united the club for as long as he did. But it was never going to last.

[Redleg 40,948]

Paul Roos in his Herald Sun column today on tanking, used Paul Gardner's comments as proof of it happening. That is one of the reasons PG shouldn't have made the comments. It has hurt our club.

[jayceebee31 761]

Never forget Paul Gardner spoke to interested members at the Bentleigh Club years ago in the depths of another period of Club despair. Amusingly the talk that night centered around the need to get a young Matthew Bate into the senior team.

At any rate after a stage managed talk Grdner retired to the bar and invited members to join him. Once there he surrounded himself with a group of heavies....that's fat blokes as opposed to the other type of heavies, had a few quick drinks and was gone.

Never impressed me from the time he said it was more important to go on some hiking trek than fulfill his Presidential duties. Another Melbourne lightweight.

Paul was compete baggage. I had no respect in him as President and no respect in him now. A bitter, twisted jerk if you ask me.

[Footynut 302]

I beg to differ. Melbourne has the reputation for being the most factionalised club in the AFL for good reason.

Jim Stynes performed a minor miracle when he united the club for as long as he did. But it was never going to last.

Let's agree to disagree. True MFC people are those who seek to sacrifice themselves for the good of the club. Anyone who is party to a faction that is not seeking to unite the club is in fact then working against the club and for themselves.

[Apocalypse XXXI 243]

Like many, I have tremendous reservations about a former president coming out and commenting about specific allegations against his club which might result in damaging sanctions being enforced against it, particularly at a time when the club is already against substantial threat and attacks in the media, some of it justified, most of it not.

Like Paul, I felt most uncomfortable about that period in the club's history. The moral dilemma of knowing that defeat was more important than victory and the consequences which that entailed was probably the most bitter feeling I have tasted personally in all of my days as a supporter of this club.

For that I blame the AFL and the collective leadership of all of the AFL clubs (including Paul Gardner).

The dilemma of the priority pick and the temptation to tank or to experiment or to skillfully manage your list to take advantage of the draft rules didn't emerge overnight in the latter half of the 2009 season.

It was around in the late 1990s when Fremantle disintegrated at a time when Paul Haselby was the next best thing. After that we had St. Kilda, Carlton (on several occasions), the Western Bulldogs, Hawthorn and Collingwood all exposed to the dilemma and then us and later, the Eagles. You could write an interesting book on some of the positional moves, team changes, early surgeries, disciplining of players and other tactics and strategies employed that can be pointed out and attributed to clubs that strangely enough, all just happened to end up with priority draft picks.

So where was the AFL on this issue for the best part of a decade?

Where were club presidents like Paul Gardner and others in 2007 when Carlton was pulling off the biggest draft rort in history right in front of all us in the Kreuzer Cup game. I accept that his team wasn't tanking that evening but if we're now taking a highly principled moral stand about wiping out tanking (and I agree that we should) then where were Andrew Demetriou and where was Paul Gardner and all of others who frown on the practice in September 2007 when Fevola was placed safely out of sight so that Lance Whitnall could miss shots from 20 metres out and Travis Johnstone was free to roam and accumulate 42 possessions?

If a policy of "no comment" publicly was good enough then, then surely it's more than good enough now.

[Hannibal 5,814]

Let's agree to disagree. True MFC people are those who seek to sacrifice themselves for the good of the club. Anyone who is party to a faction that is not seeking to unite the club is in fact then working against the club and for themselves.

I'm not really disagreeing with you. You're right to uphold and expect those values, but unfortunately this is the MFC you're talking about.

[Footynut 302]

Like many, I have tremendous reservations about a former president coming out and commenting about specific allegations against his club which might result in damaging sanctions being enforced against it, particularly at a time when the club is already against substantial threat and attacks in the media, some of it justified, most of it not.

Like Paul, I felt most uncomfortable about that period in the club's history. The moral dilemma of knowing that defeat was more important than victory and the consequences which that entailed was probably the most bitter feeling I have tasted personally in all of my days as a supporter of this club.

For that I blame the AFL and the collective leadership of all of the AFL clubs (including Paul Gardner).

The dilemma of the priority pick and the temptation to tank or to experiment or to skillfully manage your list to take advantage of the draft rules didn't emerge overnight in the latter half of the 2009 season.

It was around in the late 1990s when Fremantle disintegrated at a time when Paul Haselby was the next best thing. After that we had St. Kilda, Carlton (on several occasions), the Western Bulldogs, Hawthorn and Collingwood all exposed to the dilemma and then us and later, the Eagles. You could write an interesting book on some of the positional moves, team changes, early surgeries, disciplining of players and other tactics and strategies employed that can be pointed out and attributed to clubs that strangely enough, all just happened to end up with priority draft picks.

So where was the AFL on this issue for the best part of a decade?

Where were club presidents like Paul Gardner and others in 2007 when Carlton was pulling off the biggest draft rort in history right in front of all us in the Kreuzer Cup game. I accept that his team wasn't tanking that evening but if we're now taking a highly principled moral stand about wiping out tanking (and I agree that we should) then where were Andrew Demetriou and where was Paul Gardner and all of others who frown on the practice in September 2007 when Fevola was placed safely out of sight so that Lance Whitnall could miss shots from 20 metres out and Travis Johnstone was free to roam and accumulate 42 possessions?

If a policy of "no comment" publicly was good enough then, then surely it's more than good enough now.

Great post I agree entirely.

To me this is why I can't understand Gardner having a public opinion on this.

This shows he was always about himself and not the MFC.

[Footynut 302]

I'm not really disagreeing with you. You're right to uphold and expect those values, but unfortunately this is the MFC you're talking about.

I totally understand your realistic approach but surely we should expect better integrity from our former club presidents than this. Paul Gardner had the opportunity to say nothing and demonstrate unity. He did the opposite to serve himself. The part history of factions played in that was his own hurt ego.

[Hannibal 5,814]

I totally understand your realistic approach but surely we should expect better integrity from our former club presidents than this. Paul Gardner had the opportunity to say nothing and demonstrate unity. He did the opposite to serve himself. The part history of factions played in that was his own hurt ego.

Of course we should. Gardner is a scumbag.

[jnrmac 20,104]

I still don't know how they can prove anything.

Matthew Bate in the middle? Welcome to 2012.

Frawley up forward? Is that worse or better than Rivers and Garland up forward?

Paul Johnson down back? Stef Martin has successfully played down back. So has Sellar. Both have also rucked and played forward.

Unless you have physical evidence of officials or players discussing 'tanking', you can't prove sh*t.

We lost the game after the siren because a player who couldn't hit the side of a barn, kicked a goal from 50meters out. That would never have happened, if like Carlton, our players were told to go out and lose.

At least our players weren't missing shots on goal from 20meters out, and at least we didn't leave their best players unmatched so they could accumulate 40+ possessions.

I repeat, you can't prove sh*t. All you can categorically say is that we have been a terrible footy side for many years, and we deserve the priority pick more than Collingwood, Hawthorn and West Coast ever did!

Ain't that the truth. Is anyone out there saying we are not a crap team who deserves priority picks?? That is the reality unlike West Coke on 2010 & others

[jnrmac 20,104]

I beg to differ. Melbourne has the reputation for being the most factionalised club in the AFL for good reason.

Jim Stynes performed a minor miracle when he united the club for as long as he did. But it was never going to last.

What speculative crap. Where can you point to evidence of that.

North Melb isn't divided?? Eugene Arocca?? Brayshaw?? Peter de Rauch?? At least they can play footy which is a lot more than can be said of us.

[Hannibal 5,814]

What speculative crap. Where can you point to evidence of that.

North Melb isn't divided?? Eugene Arocca?? Brayshaw?? Peter de Rauch?? At least they can play footy which is a lot more than can be said of us.

It's well known junior. Where have you been ?

Supporters that have little understanding of our history always amuse me. In this instance, you've gone out of your way to publicly give yourself an embarrassing uppercut. Who needs enemies when you've got yourself ?

For you though it's hardly surprising, or unusual.

[Range Rover 1,935]

The tanking/poor club culture meme is a furphy and a pretext for a good old fashioned power struggle.

Healy/Sheahan/Roos pointed to a ridiculously simplistic graph in their attack on Melbourne showing us at 2 wins this year compared to Bailey's 8 wins last year, intimating that was evidence of a losing culture engendered by 'tanking'.

Only, we 'tanked' in 2009, therefore the "losing culture" was inculcated way back then. Yet Bailey went on to have progressively more successful seasons (win-wise) in 2010 and 2011 !!

A theory with more holes than a block of Swiss cheese, if ever there was one.

Don't let the 'tanking' garbage blind you to the true motives of the parties involved here.

[Sir Why You Little 37,049]

The tanking/poor club culture meme is a furphy and a pretext for a good old fashioned power struggle.

Healy/Sheahan/Roos pointed to a ridiculously simplistic graph in their attack on Melbourne showing us at 2 wins this year compared to Bailey's 8 wins last year, intimating that was evidence of a losing culture engendered by 'tanking'.

Only, we 'tanked' in 2009, therefore the "losing culture" was inculcated way back then. Yet Bailey went on to have progressively more successful seasons (win-wise) in 2010 and 2011 !!

A theory with more holes than a block of Swiss cheese, if ever there was one.

Don't let the 'tanking' garbage blind you to the true motives of the parties involved here.

So you think Gerard is working for or against his younger brother?

[Range Rover 1,935]

So you think Gerard is working for or against his younger brother?

I would like to know what Greg's thoughts are on attempts to get Travis Cloke to the club.

His brother seems dead against it ... http://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/afl-premiership/demons-pursuit-of-star-magpie-travis-cloke-overlooks-their-biggest-deficiency-writes-gerard-healy/story-e6frf3e3-1226436441146

[Sir Why You Little 37,049]

I would like to know what Greg's thoughts are on attempts to get Travis Cloke to the club.

His brother seems dead against it ... http://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/afl-premiership/demons-pursuit-of-star-magpie-travis-cloke-overlooks-their-biggest-deficiency-writes-gerard-healy/story-e6frf3e3-1226436441146

Does it matter what Gerard thinks on this issue?

[Range Rover 1,935]

Does it matter what Gerard thinks on this issue?

On the Cloke issue or the little matter of having Brock McLean on his show to grill him about tanking?

[Range Rover 1,935]

WYL?

[Sir Why You Little 37,049]

WYL?

On the whole issue. You are pointing a finger at Gerard, i am wondering why?

The disharmony to all this will come from players who were involved (186) & other relevent games.

Gerard is just after ratings for his show.

[Range Rover 1,935]

On the whole issue. You are pointing a finger at Gerard, i am wondering why?

The disharmony to all this will come from players who were involved (186) & other relevent games.

Gerard is just after ratings for his show.

I would be looking in to Gerard's ties with his little bro. Let's just leave it at that.

Another interesting fact by the way ... Very recently, Leigh Matthews stepped down from the All-Australian selection comittee and was replaced by? ... Gerard Healy. Who appointed him? Why Andrew Demetriou and Adrian Anderson of course, also members of the committee.

Now, that would be annoying I wouldv'e thought for Demetriou for this recent appointment to an AFL committee to be stoking up the flames of tanking again, especially when the issue was seemingly dead and buried.

"What a pr1ck of a thing for Gerard to have done!"

Unless of course Andrew agrees with the intent of the attack which has clearly been to bring heat to bear on one particular senior club official at Melbourne.

Fun and games, boys and girls. Fun and games.

Edited August 4, 2012 by Range Rover

[Sir Why You Little 37,049]

I would be looking in to Gerard's ties with his little bro. Let's just leave it at that.

Another interesting fact by the way ... Very recently, Leigh Matthews stepped down from the All-Australian selection comittee and was replaced by? ... Gerard Healy. Who appointed him? Why Andrew Demetriou and Adrian Anderson of course, also members of the committee.

Now, that would be annoying I wouldv'e thought for Demetriou for this recent appointment to an AFL committee to be stoking up the flames of tanking again, especially when the issue was seemingly dead and buried.

"What a pr1ck of a thing for Gerard to have done!"

Unless of course Andrew agrees with the intent of the attack which has clearly been to bring heat to bear on one particular senior club official at Melbourne.

Fun and games, boys and girls. Fun and games.

But what has Gerard got to gain by doing all that RR.

We need to get right to the bottom of the tanking issue, but i think you are opening the wrong doors thus far.

[Hannibal 5,814]

I would like to know what Greg's thoughts are on attempts to get Travis Cloke to the club.

http://www.foxsports...3-1226436441146

He is against it, but us going for Cloke has no bearing on addressing our midfield. He rightly points out that there are no gun mids on the horizon this year through FA, and we won't need to give up picks for Cloke - in the unlikely event he wants to come to Melbourne. In essence, we can address our midfield concerns with Viney, 3, 4, 13, etc. and still recruit Cloke.

The only premise to his argument is the financial cost and the burden his salary will have on future re-signings. And yes, that's a relevant point. But it's a relevant point for any club.

Jon Anderson in the HS thinks Cloke won't choose the Dees because we'll probably not play finals in the next 5 years and certainly won't win a flag. I think he's way off the mark with how quickly our list can improve if we get things right during this off-season.

[Range Rover 1,935]

But what has Gerard got to gain by doing all that RR.

We need to get right to the bottom of the tanking issue, but i think you are opening the wrong doors thus far.

Gerard's brother is Director of Football at the Melbourne Football Club, WYL.

Wake up and smell the arabica roast coffee beans.

[Sir Why You Little 37,049]

Gerard's brother is Director of Football at the Melbourne Football Club, WYL.

Wake up and smell the arabica roast coffee beans.

Yes i know exactly what sugar is to the MFC RR. Don't be so condescending.

And what does Gerard gain out of your scenario??