We’d sat out the NAB Challenge pre-season competition as a precaution: with any backdating on penalty, those three games would likely be taken into account. The club had been forced to bring in replacements from the VFL and other competitions around Australia so we could field a team in the pre-season competition. Included in that group were several ex-AFL players, such as Geelong’s Mitch Brown, Adelaide’s Jared Petrenko and Melbourne pair James Magner and Mitch Clisby.
There had been a discussion among the playing group – driven by senior players Brendon Goddard and Paul Chapman, who weren’t at the club during the 2012 season – about not taking part in the NAB Challenge. They were upset with what was happening to their teammates and wanted to make a statement. In the end a compromise was reached and we managed to scrape together a team with the help of the replacements for the opening game of the series against St Kilda in Morwell. The crazy thing was we weren’t allowed to have any contact with the team on game day. We’d been told that if we wanted to go down there and watch, we basically had to stay in our cars because we weren’t allowed in the rooms.
That would go to a whole new level if we were suspended. We’d had some meetings at the club about the doomsday scenario. We wouldn’t be allowed to set foot in our Melbourne Airport training facility or have any contact with the coaching or fitness staff. There would be no access to medical or physio services either, plus we wouldn’t be getting paid. Training sessions at public ovals around Melbourne with 20 other blokes was the picture being painted.
Through it all we’d tried to prepare as best we could for a good result, which would have us playing Sydney at ANZ Stadium on the Saturday. Hirdy had slipped back into the head coaching role seamlessly and we’d trained as hard as I could ever remember us training. We’d certainly looked at the Port Adelaide model and what they’d been able to achieve with their elite fitness base the previous year. The kilometres I’d done were the most of my 23 pre-seasons. I was always sceptical when the fitness staff and coaches talked about stepping up to another level, but they certainly weren’t joking this time. In our three main running and skills sessions for the week we were getting measured in everything we did, and you wouldn’t get off the track without doing between 10 and 12 kilometres.
This was a challenge for me. In the future I had no idea how players were going to do more. It certainly felt like we were at the optimum. While I love training because it is a great distraction, over the past month it had dragged on. Not being able to play any games meant we had to try to replicate match situations on the training track. We had a competitive training session with VFL team Williamstown that in the old days would have been called a practice match, but because of what was hanging over our heads we weren’t officially supposed even to have any of those. The AFL was in attendance for the hit-out, which was being described as a ‘competitive training drill’. What hurt mentally was that with all this tough training during the week, the reward of playing a game on the weekend wasn’t there. There was nothing to look forward to.
The saga had already cost us one of our best players, with Paddy Ryder leaving for Port Adelaide. He’d been particularly troubled by the uncertainty around what we’d been injected with given his partner had fallen pregnant and doctors were telling him there could be an impact on his unborn son. It was a tough situation. He’d had the locker next to me for years so we spent a lot of time together. He was a ripping bloke but I understood how he’d been worn down by the affair. We all had been. Two and a half years is a long time to live in a world of uncertainty.
All I could think about as I got into the lift to go upstairs to the meeting room was the ‘blackest day in sport’ press conference. That had been such a massive thing at the time that I couldn’t help but wonder how we could be let off given the song and dance that had ensued about drugs in sport after that day.
The mood was sombre when I walked into the room, as expected. No-one from the club administration was present; it was just the players. None of us knew what to say as we grabbed our seats and waited for movement on the big screen at the front of the room.
It wasn’t long until three men appeared there. They were the tribunal members and I’d read enough in recent days to know that the one in the middle was the chairman, David Jones. He would be delivering the verdict. The camera cut away for a moment to show our legal counsel, David Grace, and then the ASADA representatives.
When Jones started his address all that was running through my head was two words: not guilty. That’s all I wanted to hear.
‘The tribunal was comfortably satisfied that the substance thymosin beta-4 was at the relevant time a prohibited substance under the code,’ Jones said. ‘The tribunal was not comfortably satisfied that any player was administered thymosin beta-4.’
Where’s the ‘not guilty’?
Jones continued: ‘The tribunal was not comfortably satisfied that any player violated clause 11.2 of the AFL Anti-Doping Code . . .’
Not guilty? What was he saying?
No-one said anything for what felt like five minutes (it was really 15 seconds) and then a voice at the back, which I think belonged to Jobe Watson, yelled out, ‘We’re off!’
The place erupted. ‘Not comfortably satisfied’ meant not guilty. There were lots of high-fives and hugging as we all got around each other. I couldn’t believe it and after the initial euphoria I sat back down and tried to take in what had just happened.
We were all straight on the phone to our loved ones. Suzie could sense how relieved I was and said she was looking forward to sharing the news with the boys, who were still at school.
Beers were brought out, but I didn’t feel like celebrating. I couldn’t help but think about what we’d been through over the past two and a half years. We were never going to get that time back again. It had been the most stressful period of my life, and all for no reason. There was anger and sadness and it was a bizarre feeling to see all my teammates smiling again. It had been a long time since that had happened.
We made our way to another meeting room in the hotel where a press conference was to be held. Jobe addressed the media with us all standing behind him as a show of support.
‘We found ourselves in a situation we could never have imagined,’ he said. ‘It is a position and experience none of us should have been part of. We had nothing to hide and we fully cooperated with the investigation.
‘When you live through something for 26 months, it becomes a part of you. This experience is a bit surreal. I think the players have coped with it as best as anyone could possibly do so.
‘I don’t think if this was an individual sport we could have got through, because of the stress that was involved in the situation, the uncertainty, the length of time. I think we drew on each other for laughter when we needed a circuit-breaker and I know I couldn’t have got through this without the guys behind me.
‘We want to go to bed at night and not have it be the last thing we think of, and the first thing we think of when we wake up. That’s what we want – we want to play this game that we loved playing as kids, and we want our supporters to be proud of us.’
Jobe was brilliant. He had grown as a leader throughout the scandal and couldn’t have handled the situation any better.
When we got back to the other room, Grace appeared and walked in with his arms raised in victory. That set off the celebrations again. We moved location to the nearby Botanical Hotel, where the rest of the playing group had assembled. They’d done this off their own bat and their support throughout had been special. Officials from the club also arrived and we had a meal together, but I only had a sip of beer. I think the alcohol intake may have been different if we’d got a different result, but I was very much focused on Saturday and getting back to doing what I loved: playing football.
I left the pub at 8.30 pm and the best part of the whole day came when I walked in the door at home. Max and Mason raced up to me and leapt into my arms. They were so happy.
Suzie c
ould tell I wasn’t right. ‘Are you happy?’ she asked.
‘I am, but I don’t know – it’s a funny type of feeling.’
The not knowing for so long and all the scrutiny had got to me. What had scared me the most was not missing a couple of games of football but being branded a drug cheat. The fact that my name could have been on the ASADA website alongside other drug cheats didn’t sit well with me. Everyone is different, and that probably didn’t come into the thinking of the younger guys, who were all about whether they missed any games. They would have easily moved on but I don’t think I could have. The stigma of the whole episode had haunted me. The last thing I wanted after 23 years and 400-odd games was that when you typed my name into Google the first thing that would come up would be a reference to the drugs scandal.
Now, finally, we had a clean slate – although the media the next day reported that ASADA was considering whether to appeal. Even if they didn’t, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) could come over the top. The club and lawyers were confident that wouldn’t eventuate, as the AFL’s Anti-Doping Tribunal had ruled there wasn’t enough evidence to suggest any wrongdoing.
We’d been given the day off but I went into the club just for a light workout because I wanted to get into footy mode. A number of my teammates had the same idea.
*
Before Thursday’s main training session, Jobe called us all in for a players-only meeting. He said that it was the last time he would talk about ASADA. It was an emotional speech and he had tears in his eyes as he spoke for 15 minutes about how the saga had affected him. He said he couldn’t have got through it without the support of every person in the room. There was probably more emotion shown then than two days earlier when the decision was handed down. It was a good way to put a full stop to the whole saga.
When we got out onto the track, Hirdy came over to me as we hadn’t had the chance to speak over the previous couple of days. ‘How did you go with it all?’ he asked.
I explained my mixed emotions and he immediately understood where I was coming from. In my career I’d never experienced any major hurdles until this. Hirdy knew me as well as anybody and said he’d noticed how heavily it had weighed on me, particularly after I’d received the infraction notice.
‘Your demeanour changed,’ he said. ‘You were running around like a chook with its head cut off the session after it. This time, just go out and train normally. Don’t do anything silly as we’ve got a big game in a couple of days.’
Playing in Sydney was probably a good thing. Getting out of town as a group and away from the constant commentary was perfect. From the moment we stepped on the plane, not a word about what had happened earlier in the week was uttered. It was bucketing down when we arrived in the Harbour City on the Friday afternoon, and much the same on the Saturday. Everyone was wondering how we’d cope given we hadn’t had a game in the lead-up to the match. I wasn’t as worried as others about it, because the sessions we’d completed were pretty close to the mark.
That confidence appeared to be well founded when I watched one of our new recruits, former Western Bulldogs star midfielder Adam Cooney, unleash a torpedo after the quarter-time siren to give us a 26-point lead. The Swans didn’t get their first goal until the 17-minute mark of the second quarter and that’s all they had at half-time, with our lead a handy 22 points.
We kept it rolling in the third quarter, with our intensity and run overwhelming the home team, and at three-quarter time we’d increased the margin to 34 points. Sydney superstar Lance Franklin kicked the opening goal of the final term at the six-minute mark and it was obvious they were lifting. We had known that would happen at some stage given that they were such a great team – they’d played off in the Grand Final the previous year against Hawthorn.
Two goals in a row to Kurt Tippett had them suddenly within 14 points entering time-on. Our midfield pressure had dropped off and the Swans were having entry after entry. We needed to score as that was the best way to stop the momentum. Instead, goals to Craig Bird and Kieren Jack saw the scores level at the 27-minute mark. We were out on our legs and mentally shot as well.
Franklin swooped in and kicked his third goal to give them the lead, and then Swans debutant Isaac Heeney finished it with an impressive shot from 50 metres. Sydney had kicked seven goals in the final term while we’d failed to score. It could have been a historic win for us; instead, we were left in shock at the fade-out. Once the dust had settled, the enormity of our performance given the circumstances was acknowledged – but we should have won.
I pulled up a bit tight in the groin and on the Tuesday spoke to Hirdy about maybe this week’s clash with Hawthorn being one of those games I could sit out. It hadn’t improved by Friday so I was in the stands the following day watching as my team started rank outsiders against the premiers.
A 22-point lead at half-time had me on the edge of my seat but I was nearly falling off it in the final term as Hawthorn hit the front. Then an unlikely hero stood up. Hawthorn led by 16 points at the 18-minute mark but my fellow defender Cale Hooker ran onto a loose ball and kicked what can only be described as an inside-out floater, which sailed through to give us an extraordinary two-point win. We’d got ourselves off the canvas. After everything we’d been through, it was a magnificent moment for the club.
I returned the following week, when we comfortably took care of Carlton, but my final Anzac Day game didn’t go according to plan. These were the games I loved – a packed MCG with 90,000 people – and I tried to keep out the emotion of it being my last roll of the dice. Unfortunately, we didn’t adapt to the wet conditions as well as Collingwood and went down by 20 points in a low-scoring affair.
A couple of weeks later I was a man in demand when I became the first 40-year-old in almost a century to play in a VFL/AFL match. I was presented with a birthday cake at training as part of a media conference by my old coach Kevin Sheedy, who’d returned to Essendon in an ambassadorial role. To mark the occasion Sheeds read out my tribunal rap sheet to show how I could have already been well over the 400-game barrier – the next box I was about to tick.
‘When he started, he had to go and play on Kernahan, Lockett, Dunstall and Ablett,’ Sheeds said. ‘There were actually nine or 10 key forwards in the AFL, and he’s in Year 12. So if you ever threw anybody to the wolves you threw him to the wolves. The game has ramped up [and] I’m not quite sure whether many of the great forwards would be able to play [today]. But Dustin Fletcher’s been able to do it.’
TIM WATSON
Essendon legend, played 307 games, captain, three premierships
It’s like the stories of your football club. It’s not a premiership but it’s like the story and legend of Coleman, it’s like the story and legend of Dick Reynolds when you go through the history of the club. They will always be celebrated forever.
You look at the Sheedy years and those years will be celebrated and they will be written about, talked about forever for anyone that ever comes in contact with the Essendon Football Club.
Now the legend of Fletcher will be added to all that and it fits perfectly.
Playing 400 games is something I can’t really get my head around. What is funny, you know Bartlett did it, you know Tuck did it but because I was still playing then you probably don’t observe it the way you do when you’re out of the game and you’re looking at somebody else doing it.
I look at Fletch now and start to stack up the years. I work with guys who are around his age, you look at them and think you couldn’t possibly be playing AFL football.
You look at someone like Dustin being able to do it and it’s just extraordinary.
I remember him as a kid – he was just painfully shy and even when he started in the AFL he was painfully shy.
When he lined up on the likes of Kernahan then he probably hardly even looked him in the eye, not that he was intimidated but more just boyishly respectful of him.
When I first got to Essendon, Ken Fletcher was a PE teacher at E
ssendon High School where I went when I’d come down from the country.
He used to give me a lift to training and I actually baby-sat Dustin when he was a kid as well.
So Ken was my captain and now my son is Dustin’s captain. It is sort of ridiculous.
CHAPTER 20
DEJA VU
‘Fletcher, you fucking drug cheat.’
I heard the abuse from behind me but rather than turn around straightaway I looked at Max, who was seated inside the car, and hoped the window was up. Thankfully, it was.
It was a Sunday morning in Union Road and I’d just slipped down to the local cafe to get a coffee. The cafe was full of people who had all heard the abuse and were now looking at me to see my reaction. I’d learnt to ignore it, and quickly got in the car.
‘What did they yell out at you?’ Max asked.
‘Nothing, mate,’ I said quickly. ‘It must have been something about the Bombers.’
This had happened dozens of times over the past couple of years, but the fact it was still happening after we’d been cleared really hit home. I knew I was probably going to have to live with it for the rest of my life. I always thought when I finished up I’d be appreciated for what I did for my footy club, but I suppose for opposition supporters or people who don’t like me then the ASADA scandal is going to be the first thing that comes up every time.
I knew it was going to take a while before even my friends and former teammates stopped asking about it. They all had the same question: why did I have the needles? It’s something I still ask myself. How could I have had 35 needles in my stomach? Why? Why? Why?
But the way the program had been presented to us by Stephen Dank, the coaches and the medical staff had made us feel that it was above board. We had been told it was to help us improve as a group and most of us thought the needles were along the same lines as vitamins.
Fletch Page 20
