Past Brendan Fevola #2 (2010-2011)

[Grimreepah]

Lions Statement: Brendan Fevola
10:12 PM Sun 20 Feb, 2011

Dear members and supporters,

The Board of the Brisbane Lions this afternoon made the decision to terminate the contract of Brendan Fevola.

The decision to terminate Brendan's contract was reached by the Board of the Lions at a special meeting conducted this afternoon, having taken into account the views of the Club's administration and football departments, as well as the need to protect and uphold the culture and reputation of the Club.

The grounds for termination were that Brendan had engaged in serious or willful misconduct through persistent breaches of his obligations as a player to the Club.

Discussion Thread

 

[Grimreepah]

Alistair Lynch

"Brendan accepts that he has let his club and his teammates down but is committed to making amends and has always felt that the first step in making things right was his commitment to an extensive rehabilitation program to combat his battle with depression," Lynch said. "He has stayed 51 days in a voluntary rehabilitation clinic and had reached the stage where he felt the next step was to return to football.
"He was fully prepared to return to the club under whatever conditions the club chose to impose."

 

[Grimreepah]

Brendan Fevola's sacking a disgrace: Wayne Schwass

• Mark Stevens
• From: Herald Sun
• February 21, 2011 12:00AM

"For the first time in Fev's life, he's actually tried to take some responsibility for his actions by admitting himself in for help," Schwass said. "Where's the compassion and where's the understanding?" Schwass said Fevola had made poor decisions, but that problems including clinical depression provided "legitimate explanations" for some of his actions.
"The really, really disappointing thing is there are other Brendan Fevolas out there, who their teammates or managers may not know about. This is not going to encourage them to come forward and seek help," he said.

 

[whatboutbob]

I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm intrigued to know what Jeff Kennett has to say about this situation.

 

[Grimreepah]

Link to article

BRISBANE coach Michael Voss admitted to Lions officials on Sunday night his recruiting of Brendan Fevola had been a stuff-up as he endorsed the board's decision to sack the shattered forward. Voss fronted a board that had unanimously agreed to terminate Fevola's $1.5m contract and confirmed the football department was 100 per cent behind them.

 

[Grimreepah]

Angus Johnson

In a sign the Lions are determined to wash their hands of Fevola, Johnson said he was open to negotiations over the terms of a payout and had no interest in a lengthy legal battle. And he rubbished claims from Fevola's management team Velocity Sports that the club acted illegally in sacking the troubled forward.
"I think there was just a series of persistent breaches, as a club we had lost confidence in his ability to meet his obligations," he said.
"It gets to a stage where the continuing promises that he will change and it will never happen again, they wear a little thin.
"We have a young list, we are rebuilding this football club and we have expectations of all our staff -- that includes all of our players - to meet meet society's standards.
"He wasn't meeting his obligations, he has been in the game for a long time.
"It is disappointing that after all these years he continues to commit breaches."

 

[Grimreepah]

Link to article

The Brisbane Lions board had had enough. And so had the players.

When the move to expel Fevola was floated among the Lions senior players last week none dissented.

There was not the hostility or anger among the players that pushed Jason Akermanis into exile, just a sad acceptance that Fevola's waywardness could no longer be tolerated.

 

[Grimreepah]

David Parkin

"I think it’s a really sad day. It’s a sad day for the boy, obviously. He is a remarkable person, a remarkable footballer. It’s just sad that it has to come to this."

"He would probably like to be back in Melbourne (with his family).

"I think if he was back in Melbourne with those close by and the support systems that are there, someone might be in the position to take him on. I’m not sure who that would be or whether I’d be one of them but certainly he has so much to offer as a 30-year old and that loss to the game is just a tragic circumstance."

 

[Grimreepah]

Matt Finnis (Afl Players' Association chief executive)

"Given the position that Brendan has been in during recent weeks, I think it is unfortunate from a timing perspective," Finnis said on Monday.

"But I do understand that the Brisbane Lions, over the last several weeks, have certainly acted in a manner which is consistent with promoting Brendan's health and well-being.

"So while I question the timing, I understand from my conversations with the Lions that they believe that they've acted in accordance with medical advice.

"Brendan has in the past been a difficult and challenging employee for his AFL clubs and we have an empathy for Brisbane.

"But they've also taken the most serious action that can be taken in relation to a player's contract."

 

[Grimreepah]

Brown

"At the end of the day he lost the trust of the playing group over the course of time. You lose the trust of the playing group, it's hard to come back from that," Brown said on Monday afternoon.

"When the playing group is united on it, he has to move forward. It's bloody unfortunate but at the end of the day that's the reality of it," he said.

"It's disappointing we've lost a player of that talent but there are 44 other blokes there who have got plenty of talent who are all pulling in the one direction."

Voss

"Whenever you recruit a player, you recruit them on the premise that they can make you better," Voss told a packed media conference in Brisbane.

"That's what we hoped to get and clearly we didn't get that, so for us, I can't sit here and say it wasn't a mistake because he's now left our football club.

"But it's important to also realise that you can't make two [mistakes]. That's why this decision needs to be made and I'm fully supportive, absolutely, of what the board has done."

 

[Grimreepah]

Brisbane too slow in sacking Fevola
By Kim Hagdorn
21 February 2011 05:38PM EST

Mid-way through last year as the Lions stumbled through a succession of the controversial forward’s indiscretions, a young Lions player in only his second season told Fevola to “piss off.”
“This is giving me the shits. I wish I wasn’t here,” Fevola is alleged to have said.
“Why don’t you just piss off then and do us all a favour,” the new kid blurted in front of teammates as they gathered at a witches hat in the middle of training drill.

When a Melbourne-based club coach and his assistants interviewed a top Brisbane player who was on the market last October, he was asked bluntly why he wanted to leave the Lions. Without hesitation, he said the place was so unstable and troubled because of Fevola.

Discussion thread

 

[Grimreepah]

Fevola's inevitable fall
21/02/2011 11:29 AM
Bren O'Brien
Sportal

When Fevola appeared in an ABC documentary called The Draft in 1998 which detailed the then 17-year-old's ambitions for an AFL career, it was obvious that the talented forward was a different fish to those he swum with.

While the other subjects of the documentary, Adam Ramanauskas and Des Headland, spoke of their burning desire to play in the big league, Fevola seemed indifferent to his future, saying it was a good way to earn money and he would get what he could out of it.

There was then, as there has been for most of his career, a sense of naivety about the world he was going to enter and how being an AFL player would affect his life.

 

[Grimreepah]

Shanghai booze-up 'led to Fevola's sacking'
Megan Levy
February 22, 2011 - 9:06AM

A boozy incident that occurred in front of the AFL hierarchy in China is believed to be one of the "multiple serious breaches" behind Brendan Fevola's sacking from the Brisbane Lions.
Fevola was in Shanghai with the Lions for an exhibition clash against Melbourne in October when he was reportedly ejected from a nightclub during a night out with teammates.
He also missed a team meeting the following morning.

 

[Grimreepah]

Lions to offer sacked Brendan Fevola a $1million payout

• Andrew Hamilton
• From: The Courier-Mail
• February 22, 2011 7:13AM

THE Brisbane Lions will present axed forward Brendan Fevola with a take-it-or-leave-it payout offer of about $1 million.
The key component of the offer will be a clause that prohibits Fevola from making any public comments about the Lions club, but it is understood they would not block his attempts to sell an exclusive interview about the next stage of his life.

 

[Axel.]

Is that picture really appropriate, Grim?

 

[Grimreepah]

Is that picture really appropriate, Grim?

It could not be more appropriate.

 

[Grimreepah]

Eddie McGuire

On Melbourne radio this morning, McGuire said: "Fev sent me a text last night, 'just been sacked' was his first bit."

"Then I sent one back to him. He got back to me and said, 'shattered can't get my head around it. Haven't done anything'. There's three hour debate on that one line.

"He said 'I'm shattered at the moment, with what I am doing here.' He said 'mate, I am just shattered at the moment dealing with what I am in here for and to get sacked I just wouldn't know what to say' so he's flabbergasted."

Eddie McGuire

“He doesn’t know what to do now with his football life,” McGuire told Triple M’s Hot Breakfast.“Because of the current rules of AFL he can’t go on to a list even though he’s been sacked which is something that I think if I was his manager I’d be hitting the AFL up (on).”
“I’d be also hitting them pretty hard with maybe unfair dismissal in this situation as well, however he should get his payout which is around the 1.4 (million) plus a couple of hundred thousand from Carlton who are still playing into his contract at the Brisbane Lions.
“He could (get on an AFL list) next year but if you’re 30 years of age you don’t want to be out of football for a year, do you?”
“So it will be interesting to see whether or not Brendan will try to, I know he’s thinking of and asking various people about whether or not he can go onto a VFL list.”

 

[mickeyblueeyes37]

Oh so they sack him over a October Incident this club's a pack of moron's.

 

[Grimreepah]

Jason Akermanis

"They are starting to become repeat offenders in the way they treat people, I can actually feel the same feelings he is feeling having been told the same things like, 'You are not wanted'," Akermanis said."I found it to be hypocritical and a double standard when there are people who have been devastated by floods and cyclones in Queensland and the Lions are making all this noise about being a community club, but here is a guy in their own community, the football community, and he needs help.
"There is no doubt that Fev will always be the most responsible person for his actions, but the questions of the leadership at the Lions that I had in my time hasn't changed in five years.
"They have got rid of a guy because it all got a little hard."

 

[Grimreepah]

Leigh Matthews

"It has been an unbelievably disastrous event," Matthews said."He (coach Michael Voss) and (former Lions recruitment chief Graeme) "Gubby" Allan were the people who recruited him.
"If it was a bad decision, it is always bad for the person who made the decision.
"It was a very big investment in dollars. It's blown up big time. They take that risk and the risk blew up in their faces."
"It's no use sticking with a bad decision.
"If you think it is the best for him to not be around the club (then sack him)."

 

[mickeyblueeyes37]

Good on you Akermanis I agree and why Voss was hired as coach I don't have a clue.Going to be a big clean out at the end of the year up at the gabba.

 

[Grimreepah]

Caroline Wilson

The club had no hope of rebuilding its shattered list with Fevola on board. He is 30, he is unfit, he is damaged, dysfunctional, unpredictable and he cannot be trusted. He came to the club with all sorts of serious baggage and in 12 short months created more havoc than even this serial Fevola doubter could have predicted.

Now, incredibly, the Lions face criticism for their ''handling'' of the Fevola sacking. This defies belief. Fevola's manager Alastair Lynch has ''handled'' the situation quite brilliantly. With Fevola's life and career spiralling out of control again after yet another bender he took the inspired decision to place the troubled star in a rehabilitation facility.

 

[Grimreepah]

Rohan Connolly

One of the biggest nails in his coffin at Carlton was his refusal to show the right way to those learning the ropes. ''It wasn't just the stuff that gets in the papers,'' said one exasperated Blues' official last year, ''it was the constant battles with him about everything. He was charismatic and he was bloody good. But the same bloke would walk around the gym and have a go at guys because they were doing extra weights, or something. You don't need that sort of crap and we don't have to worry about it any more. Life's so much easier.''

 

[Grimreepah]

Phil Jauncey

"An athlete's ego is driven always by the next game or the next season. When you retire or have your career ended by injury, it's horrid," said Jauncey, who has worked with the Brisbane Lions but not during Fevola's time there."It's tough when you have to replace that with something else. It's like riding a jet ski. Momentum is everything. The only thing you don't want to do is stop because if you do, you sink. You need forward momentum."

 

[Grimreepah]

Link to article

Despite threats of legal action and suggestions of damaging friction between the Fevola camp and Brisbane, it is understood a financial resolution is just days away and that neither party has any expectation of a legal dispute.

The expectation is that Fevola will receive his total 2011 contracted salary - about $1.1 million - along with a further six-figure sum for 2012 with the AFL having indicated the club can spread the payout over 2011 and 2012 to avoid a salary cap breach.