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The reaction of leading sports administrators, and if the pages of The Roar are anything to go by, most supporters, to allegations of drug abuse in Australian sport was appropriate and encouraging.
The message was received with due seriousness, disappointment but also pragmatic optimism –- take the hit but also use the opportunity to weed out the cheats and clean up properly.
Details were scant but the tone and symbolism of the announcement left no doubt: this was the darkest day in Australian sport.
Two weeks on, a picture is emerging that is far less certain, one which is fostering a swelling tide of anger among administrators, and which seems to reflect poorly on some of the people at the centre of the announcement.
Two things are certain; first, the Australian Crime Commission (ACC) is conducting an investigation which has uncovered drug use among Australian sportsmen. And second, there are some Australian sportsmen (and women) who are using prohibited drugs of some description.
What’s uncertain is the number of people involved, who they are, who they play for, and the extent of the abuse. The reaction of NSW Sports minister Graham Annesley suggests that there are indeed serious concerns, but it will be some time until we know whether these are real and current as opposed to potential.
So far seven clubs have been offered up as being under investigation: Essendon in the AFL, plus six NRL clubs. Also one individual, Curtis Johnston, a reserve grade North Sydney rugby league player, effectively dobbed himself in courtesy of boasting via SMS of illegal steroid use, which he now says was a prank message.
Enough is already known about Essendon to accept that a serious potential problem exists, that officials and players in the club have acted unwisely, although there is some optimism that no illegal substances are involved.
But things get a lot murkier with the NRL. Not only are the clubs in the dark as to what and who, they all deny knowledge of any potential for systematic doping.
This would not have been the case for Essendon, who knew that most if not all of their playing group was involved. So if we assume that the NRL club chiefs are telling the truth – and there is no reason to suspect otherwise – it is more likely than not that if there are any transgressions at their clubs they will be isolated in nature.
A serious concern to be sure, but if so, not of the scale suggested by the “darkest day” announcement.
The gravity of the initial announcement was reinforced by heavy hitters from all four major football codes standing like accused in the dock.
But subsequent clarification that it is only AFL and NRL in the naughty corner must now have Bill Pulver and David Gallop wondering what they gave up their day for.
Now more new evidence is emerging to dilute the original assertion.
Last Friday ASADA Chief Executive Aurora Andruska released an official statement outlining how they expect to interview a total of 150 players, support staff and administrators from the two codes.
She later admitted to the Nine Network that the number of 150 was a guess. “I had a lot of pressure on me to say lots of sports stars were implicated in the drugs scandal and I thought 150 sounded like a good number.”
This is an astonishing admission. The “darkest day” announcement implied that the bucket was about to be tipped on multitudes of sportsmen and that compelling evidence was at hand which would be revealed to confirm this.
In the meantime the six NRL sides named are now having difficulty securing and retaining sponsors.
Cronulla presently has no major sponsor, no ground sponsor and no sleeve sponsor. It is not an exaggeration to say that the lasting impact of this situation could damage the club beyond repair. And for what?
The NRL Chief Executives met this week in Sydney. The official statement indicated an acceptance to wait for the investigation to run its course and a willingness to work with ASADA to maintain the integrity of the game.
But they would be privately furious at being prematurely offered as scapegoats, not because their clubs are riddled with cheats, but on account of a political agenda which, in the view of some of the affected clubs, has elevated the ACC investigation beyond its worth.
To understand the reason for this unsatisfactory situation is to understand the political process in Australia.
For the government of the day, whether they be Labor or Liberal, to maintain the perception that they are competent and in control, it is crucial for them to control the political agenda.
They do this via releasing information to the media timed to ensure that positive stories lead the evening news and the negative are buried on page 14.
The current government has struggled to do this lately. what better way, when desperately in need of a good news story, to wrest back control of the front pages and use this release to appear strong and in control?
We don’t know exactly how long the government had the ACC report and, to be fair, we don’t know what is in it while they do.
They obviously saw sufficient strength in it to at least have its existence released, so Ministers Jason Clare and Kate Lundy were trussed up and told to go hard.
But was this announcement made in a table-thumping manner because the evidence against clubs or players is damning, or because it suited the government’s political objective?
Strong and in control. Protecting the good citizens. No villain is safe.
To believe that the ACC investigation has been hijacked for political expediency is not to deny that drug cheats exist and will be found out. But make no mistake, despite Clare and Lundy being genuine in their personal desire to clean up sport, the involvement of these ministers and their strident behaviour threw up danger signals for me from day one.
Politics can be a ruthless and uncaring beast, and when it involves sport, no dispensation can be assumed.
Just in case any readers think I’m channelling right wing conspiracy theorists, Wayne Smith in The Australian, on Friday 14th Feb, obtained this quote from retired Labor Senator John Black, himself the head of a drugs in sport inquiry in the 1980s. “It kept the [Eddie] Obied inquiry off the front pages for a week so that was the purpose of it. It was clearly some kind of media diversion but it was at the expense of sport.”
Fans who give heart, soul, and hard-earned cash to their chosen sport or team should rightfully feel cheated by any of their players who have placed their dreams at risk by drug cheating.
But fans could feel doubly cheated if their initial shock and grief, the cheapening of reputations, and the smear and distraction from the sport itself, was in fact in the name of politics.
Ministers Clare and Lundy and the government they represent will face their day of judgement in September.
In the meantime, for the rest of us, let us hope they keep their distance, let ASADA do their best to keep our competitions clean, and let the games continue.