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Not since “Can you smell what the Blues are cooking?” has there been an AFL club PR campaign to attract so much criticism as Essendon’s ‘comeback story’.
As Jay Croucher articulated so well on Monday, this isn’t your traditional clean-cut, feel-good story.
Half a dozen of the Essendon players on the field on Saturday night served suspensions for the use of banned peptides – whether you agree with the verdict itself or not, there is no denying the fact of its existence.
When you juxtapose that with Jarryd Roughead returning from a bout with cancer in the same game, it’s not hard to understand why many footy fans are railing against the narrative that Essendon and some sections of the media are so loudly spreading.
Were Essendon truly guilty? Were their players guilty? Those aren’t questions I’m looking to answer.
Someone out there in the AFL universe does have the answer, but whoever they are, they clearly value their personal reputation more than they do the comfort that the truth would bring the players, the club, the league, and thousands of fans.
Throughout the saga we’ve seen the people who were in power at Essendon at the time always pushing blame away from themselves onto others. Much of what they say sounds reasonable individually, but the different versions don’t add up. Someone must be telling fibs.
There will always be a sense of uncomfortable uncertainty about this period of Essendon’s history. Were the players really innocent victims? Or were they as culpable as anyone else involved? I doubt we’ll ever know for sure in any satisfying way.
On top of that is the headache that the AFL has created for itself by allowing the Bombers to retain the No.1 draft pick they were awarded last year for finishing on the bottom of the ladder, largely due to their absentees.
The quality of their list when all players are available is not so poor as to justify them being given access to the best young talent in the country, not nearly. This was a situation artificially created.
Worse still, it was created by the fact that the Bombers were ostensibly being punished – but that supposed punishment may wind up being beneficial when you consider how promising Andy McGrath looked on Saturday night.
It is mystifying and farcical to know that we live in a world where the Sydney Swans were banned from trading and free agency as a result of their perfectly legal use of trading and free agency, while Essendon’s indiscretions have been rewarded with a No.1 draft pick.
I realise that is skipping over some of the details along the way but put it simply: would Essendon have had the No.1 draft pick if they hadn’t been penalised for their actions? No.
As Essendon become a successful team this year and in the longer term, as I have earlier this year predicted they will, you can expect this to become a common point of contention.
It’s unfortunate that the AFL lacked the foresight to make the decision then that would have saved it plenty of future headaches. Such is life – this is the world we live in now.
Don’t get me wrong, none of that is meant to be a criticism of Essendon. Every club has the right to act in their own best interests, and if the AFL lets you have the No.1 draft pick, you take the No.1 draft pick.
What it all boils down to is this: AFL clubs don’t exist to make fans of all 18 teams like them. Pretty much the opposite really.
They want to inspire loyalty in their fans, and beyond that, it’s probably better to be hated than liked by the opposition, because in sport, hate is at least the cousin of respect.
That’s why it makes little sense for an opposition fan to complain about Essendon and the media trying to sell them the ‘comeback story’. No one’s trying to sell it to you – they’re selling it to Dons fans, you just happen to be watching the advertising.
Why would the Bombers care what opposition fans think of it? Why should it? They’re not working for them, they’re working for their own fans.
They want to give those fans hope that they can finally move forward, that they can become an elite club again. That’s what the ‘comeback story’ is about, and it is working exactly as intended.
When Essendon gets wins this year, as they did on Saturday night, and when they have success in the future, you can be certain there’ll be a chorus of crusty naysayers, desperate to put an asterisk next to anything the club achieves. There always is.
Essendon’s fans will be too busy enjoying themselves to care. As they should be.