Dangerfield flies to Melbourne as Crows stay silent
Adelaide Football Club is maintaining its silence on the future of midfield star Patrick Dangerfield, as a former Crows coach today warned: “There’s every chance we’re going to end on a sour note.”
Graham Cornes was a late ring-in to fill Dangerfield’s weekly spot on FIVEaa, after the Crows’ marquee player – expected to announce an imminent move to Geelong as a free agent – withdrew.
The radio station tweeted that Dangerfield had “bailed”, but he was boarding a plane to Melbourne as the segment aired, with the AFL’s All Australian team to be unveiled tonight.
Dangerfield is one of four Crows who were named in the extended 40-man All-Australian squad.
He told media as he touched down in Melbourne that while “decision time is looming…nothing is going to happen in the immediate future”.
Pressure has intensified on both club and player to reveal their intentions, with Caroline Wilson reporting in The Age yesterday that Adelaide has known since August its Number 32 would return home for family reasons.
“The 25-year-old told his close friend and football boss David Noble before the club’s unexpected finals campaign and will announce he wants to join Geelong during the coming week,” Wilson wrote.
Cornes, the club’s inaugural coach, said a public statement must be made “now”, and the Crows must play “hardball” to ensure they got maximum compensation.
“We all love Patrick, but the club has to play hardball … they’ve been screwed on about four different trades,” he said, citing the likes of Nathan Bock, Kurt Tippett and Jack Gunston, who he argues left the club “for bugger all really”.
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“He’s a once-in-a-generation player … you don’t let them go for a compensation pick.”
He said Adelaide, who under restricted free agency rules are entitled to match any offer Geelong makes, must tell Dangerfield: “This is not personal, we love you, but we’re not going to let you go… Geelong will not steal you.”
“There’s every chance we’re going to end on a sour note, but that’s AFL footy,” he said.
“Patrick Dangerfield’s leaving us, we’re going to have fond memories of him, but we don’t have to be best mates with him if he’s going to be playing at Geelong.”
Video below: Dangerfield at Adelaide Airport this morning. Video captured by Nathaniel Radogna
But Adelaide is maintaining its silence on the matter, with chief executive Andrew Fagan declaring “good footy clubs just don’t talk about” internal machinations.
“Whether it’s a question on a player or a question on a coach, or a question on any individual within the football club, good footy clubs just don’t talk about it,” he said on Friday, ahead of the Crows’ season-ending loss to Hawthorn.
“It’s inappropriate to talk about it, and it’s not always in our best interest to talk about it.”
Speaking at a Property Council function, Fagan said while “transparency with our supporter base” was important, “our supporters realise it’s not in their interest to talk about those things”.
“And I’m making that comment not in regard to our coach or our Number 32, but all 45 players (on our list).”
The club says he stands by his comments despite events rapidly escalating since the Hawthorn loss.
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It is putting out fires on several fronts, as it seeks to find a permanent replacement for its late senior coach Phil Walsh. It’s already rebuffed an in-season approach to its interim coaching director John Worsfold from Essendon, who is also in the market for a mentor.
Fagan, who sought an apology from the Bombers after the stealth raid, said there was a “pretty good moral code that exists most of the time (but) there’s a right way to have conversations and there’s a wrong way”.
Worsfold’s credentials have been questioned by former premiership coach Robert Walls, who wrote in Fairfax newspapers this week that “as a player and as a captain he was very good … but as a coach I think he was ordinary”.
“In 11 years as senior coach of one of the best-resourced clubs in the country, and with the best ever centre square combination (Cox, Cousins, Kerr, Judd) he finished with one premiership (by a point) and a 53 per cent winning rate,” Walls wrote.
“If you want a conservative man-on-man game plan, then Worsfold can deliver, and maybe that suits Essendon at the moment (but) if you want fast football flair and modern defensive spread, which I believe the Crows are capable of, I doubt Worsfold’s the answer.”
The Crows also received moral support from cross-town rival Port Adelaide, whose chief executive Keith Thomas said it was “just manners” to inform a rival club before trying to poach players or coaches.
“A lot of discussions go on behind closed doors, and you’d be naïve to think they don’t,” he said.
“What I think is disrespectful is the situation (we had) with Geelong chasing Travis Boak, where a coach, a captain and other senior players came into Adelaide… We were in season and I think that was disrespectful, I just don’t think that was a good look.
“But you’d be naïve to think people aren’t talking – they are – and so long as you do it in the right way, that’s ok.”
He said the situation with Port great, Graham’s son Chad Cornes, returning from GWS to Alberton to coach its SANFL side, was an example of a well-handled open negotiation, after Giants coach Leon Cameron hoped to retain Cornes as an assistant on a two-year contract.
“Chad (didn’t) want to piss off Leon … that’s good, that’s reasonable (but) it’s when it’s done the other way,” he said.
The potential Dangerfield defection has been in the spotlight all season, escalating with AFL chief Gillon McLachlan’s admission last week that he had inside knowledge of the situation.
“In my position you get information in advance of the general public,” he told AFL360 on FoxFooty.
“I am going to be really clear: there’s a whole series of things that I know at various points that it’s not appropriate for me to talk about, and I think on that one specifically people have different views but until the day something happens I don’t think you can ever be certain.”
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