The Carlton saga is embarrassing for everyone, including a good friend of mine, former CEO of the Adelaide Crows and now the boss of the Blues, Steven Trigg.
I called football with Steven in the eighties and we did some comedy together for an ABC television show called Ballzup (an apt title for what has happened at the Blues in recent weeks).
Steven is an honourable man, a man of his word, and a man who is passionate.
Steven can also be hard, but he will need to be at Carlton if he’s going to resurrect this once mighty but now struggling club.
When the Crows were charged with draft tampering and salary-cap breaches over the Kurt Tippett deal, a number of staff members were fined and suspended. It cost Trigg $50,000 and a six-month suspension.
In 2014, a year after returning from suspension, he moved to Carlton.
After an explosive interview on SEN radio, in which he claimed that Trigg had revealed that the Crows had stitched up Eddie Betts 18 months before he quit the Blues, Mick Malthouse was sacked.
Yet the mud Mick slung is going to stick stronger than Araldite to Steven’s tailored suit. Steven has history, and he knows accusations of anything untoward will make people suspicious.
This simply isn’t fair. Steven has done his time, the fine and suspension causing humiliation and embarrassment to Trigg and his family, and then there’s the issue of his credibility taking a major dive.
Steven is an outstanding administrator, yes he can be aggressive, but that’s what’s needed in the street-fighting environment of the AFL in Melbourne.
The AFL have cleared Adelaide of any draft tampering involving Betts. Steven will be relieved, but he will be also fuming that his reputation, which was on the way back up, was unduly placed in jeopardy.
Malthouse has told Fox Footy’s Gerard Whateley that when he was asked by AFL investigators to explain his comments on Wednesday, he said Trigg was totally innocent of any mischief.
Possibly the most significant words muttered by Mick Malthouse in a long time.
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