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James Hird has hailed the AFL anti-doping tribunal’s decision as a vindication of Essendon’s position that their players were never given any banned substances.
An emotional Hird also issued an unreserved apology for any damage that had been caused to the club’s reputation after the “mistakes around governance” that were made in 2012.
“I am so sorry for anything that’s happened, for anything that’s been done wrong to our players or been done wrong to our football club,” Hird said on Tuesday.
“I, and we, would never do anything intentionally to harm this football club … to harm the game of AFL football that’s given me so much and given so many people so much.
“I love the game, I love the club and I just can’t wait for the rest of the year to coach football and just get back into it again.”
Hird admitted he had come close to losing his position as senior coach at times over the past two years, but paid tribute to the strength of the club throughout the drawn-out affair.
While he admitted he still had reservations about the way the AFL-ASADA investigation was handled, Hird expressed his desire to draw a line in the sand and move on.
The coach nominated February 5, 2013 – when the club self-reported to the league – as the lowest point of the entire saga.
“The day when basically the AFL suggested that we’d taken performance-enhancing drugs,” he said.
“The AFL were quite concerned or certain that our players had taken performance-enhancing drugs.
“That was a very low period because for us.
“We thought we had a process whereby players … there’s no way that would have happened and to be thrown into an investigation like that was probably the lowest point because it put our players’ careers in jeopardy and it put this club’s existence in jeopardy.
“The supporters … the faith and the love that they have for the club it put that in jeopardy too.”
Hird said his overriding emotion when the tribunal’s verdict was one of sheer relief and joy that his players had been exonerated.
“This is all about those 34 players and whether they did or they didn’t receive performance-enhancing drugs and it’s been proven today by the tribunal that they didn’t receive performance-enhancing drugs,” he said.
“That is a fabulous relief for all of us.
“We thought that was the case and now it’s been shown to be the case after an investigation that has been enormous.
“It has been the biggest investigation, I believe, in sport around the world of this kind.”
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