Ross Oakley

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His own son apparently had an "Up Yours Oakley" bumper sticker on his car for a number of years :')

I find the whole "the AFL didn't have much to do with the demise of Fitzroy" very odd and essentially just a blatant lie. Fitzroy went through a number of options (ie "partial relocations" - moving 7 home games to Canberra, Tasmania etc) but were denied by the AFL. They simply wanted 1 less Victorian team and the other team beyond the Barassi line to have a supporter base in Melbourne like the Swans had. Why lie about it?
 
Crawb said:
His own son apparently had an "Up Yours Oakley" bumper sticker on his car for a number of years :')

I find the whole "the AFL didn't have much to do with the demise of Fitzroy" very odd and essentially just a blatant lie. Fitzroy went through a number of options (ie "partial relocations" - moving 7 home games to Canberra, Tasmania etc) but were denied by the AFL. They simply wanted 1 less Victorian team and the other team beyond the Barassi line to have a supporter base in Melbourne like the Swans had. Why lie about it?
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Simply cannot understand Oakley arguing the way he did. He should be honest and say the afl could have saved fitzroy but chose not to. It was a choice and they chose to use the demise of fitzroy to expand the competition nationally. He is entitled to say now we made the right decision and we have regrets, or we made the wrong decision but it was finely balanced. The actual answer was gutless and wrong. Own your decision.
 
melbournehammer said:
Simply cannot understand Oakley arguing the way he did. He should be honest and say the afl could have saved fitzroy but chose not to. It was a choice and they chose to use the demise of fitzroy to expand the competition nationally. He is entitled to say now we made the right decision and we have regrets, or we made the wrong decision but it was finely balanced. The actual answer was gutless and wrong. Own your decision.
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Absolutely agree.

Despite being a diehard Fitzroy and (now) Brisbane Lions fan, I think the AFL could make the case that Fitzroy just wasn't viable in the long term financially in a national competition, and for the good of the game as a whole we were sacrificed.

While definitely not all people will agree that was the case (and even less will agree the approach taken was the right one), it is a somewhat defendable position - particularly if they still acknowledge all of the costs of that decision - i.e. the trauma it caused for everyone involved in / supporting Fitzroy.

But to pretend that the AFL had nothing to do with it and they did all they could to help Fitzroy is just trying to whitewash history. It is time for the AFL to be honest and own up to what they did - even if they believe it was in the overall best interest of the game - and then try to repair some of the damage of their past decisions (e.g. ensuring the Lions play 6 games in Melbourne per year as per the merger agreement; perhaps helping to honour Fitzroy's history by contributing financially to the museum, etc.).

It still seems a long way off when you see the likes of Ross Oakley parading around pretending they had nothing to do with it.

Man up you gutless pricks.
 
Last of the Roys said:
Despite being a diehard Fitzroy and (now) Brisbane Lions fan, I think the AFL could make the case that Fitzroy just wasn't viable in the long term financially in a national competition, and for the good of the game as a whole we were sacrificed.
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Greg Swann seems to think that Fitzroy could have easily been retained in the AFL competition, had there been the will by the AFL to do so.

http://www.sen.com.au/display-article-2013/Fitzroy-could-easily-have-been-saved-Swann/65061
 
Roylion said:
Greg Swann seems to think that Fitzroy could have easily been retained in the AFL competition, had there been the will by the AFL to do so.

http://www.sen.com.au/display-article-2013/Fitzroy-could-easily-have-been-saved-Swann/65061
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I don't think there is any doubt that the afl could have saved it. They were able to strong arm clubs repeatedly and really only mcallister, gordon and to a lesser extent hore-lacy stood up to them. The rest of them were in thrall to the free market theories of the 1990s and the abolition of tariffs and making people sink or swim.

The loss of fitzroy affected a lot of people (myself included) in a way which meant that I didn't ever want to see that happen again. And that is the reason why the AFL won't let it happen again. The afl now sees the clubs as key stakeholders. Back then they were seen as the road blocks to get out of the way so that the real model could be imposed.

But the era was very very different and fitzroy was seen as a blight on the competition. The funniest thing that oakley put on gerard whateley's show last night was the 13-1 vote. What drives these things is what were the papers that the afl commission put forward to the commission - and the papers would have been - the debt is $7m (or whatver it was) each of you will have to forgo this amount of money in distributions this year, whereas we believe that we have the capacity to deliver all this extra revenue from this sort of system. If the board papers did anything other than recommend (explictly or implicitly) that fitzroy be allowed to go under I would be absolutely shocked.

Still most of you will know this stuff better than me. You've probably seen the papers which went to the afl commission at the time.
 
I have no doubt the AFL could have saved Fitzroy from the financial predicament we were in at the time (given they gave $6m for the merger).

Interesting to see Greg Swann's comments - I hadn't seem them before.

However, I am not sure we had the underlying fundamentals (including historical supporter base) to make it in the cut-throat hyper-commercialised world that the AFL has become (at least not without having a long / sustained period of on-field success first).

It is all a moot point, but our Club was so far behind by 1996 - not just the debt, but pretty much everything (as Swann's comments attest). We needed the AFL's help long before that, but of course they were busy doing all they could to get rid of us.

In any case, it can't be undone now. The least the AFL can do is acknowledge their role in it all and try to right some of the wrongs of the past.
 
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Kidd Vicious said:
Did anyone hear him on the 360? He was asked if he did everything to save the club, and said something along the lines of "Well we gave them office space in VFL house"
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Hey Fitzroy, what's happening? Listen ... uhh ... we're gonna need you to go ahead and move to Brisbane, so ... if you could just leave ... that'd be great.
 

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I couldn't even watch him on 360 - I had to switch it to a different channel as soon as he came on - get so furious just watching him.

On a related note, I was pretty bemused by Peter Gordon clowning around with him and seemingly supporting his book release.
 
As someone who supports Fitzroy in the VAFA and Geelong in the AFL, lol at all the posters bashing the Cats as a club because of one idiot.

As much as I'd love to watch the 89 GF as suggested, I think I might watch the 2007 GF instead.

And the 2009 GF.

And the 2011 GF.

Be careful you don't piss off allies because of a false collectivist perspective.
 
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He's gotten very soft treatment during his media tour for his book.

The AFL won't admit to anything about Fitzroy though because it currently has the best possible narrative being propagated as the truth; namely that fitzroy were unsavable despite help from VFL/AFL and chose to merge with brisbane and its very sad but Fitzroy are integrated lala 2001-2004.

The AFL media industry push this as the truth because they probably think it is the truth. Nearly everyone does.

Why would the AFL admit otherwise? They have no interest in damaging the brand.

Bears fans and Lions fans just be happy with your 'merged' club.
 
His book certainly gives the impression that removing Fitzroy from the AFL was one of his greater achievements.

For example: (a caption under a cartoon)

"Herald Sun cartoonist Mark Knight portrayed me many times over the journey. This one, showing me as a merciless dictator giving the thumbs down to the Lions is a favourite and decorates our stairwell at home."
 
What a heap of BS Ross. Couldn't do anything to help Fitzroy in regards to Nauru? Of course they could.

The reason that Nauru appointed an administrator to recover their $1.25 million loan was because the AFL was telling North that if they held out against Nauru, they wouldn't have to pay them at all and would receive the entire merger money themselves. The AFL then threatened to not guarantee the merger money and at one point said they were going to withdraw it completely which would have left Nauru with nothing. This forced Nauru to step in and recover the money themselves by appointing an administrator. This was despite the fact that the Fitzroy directors had already done a deal to settle with Nauru out of the merger money for $1 million. However on the AFL's advice and urging North refused to authorise Fitzroy to agree to pay any more than $550,000.

The AFL manipulated the whole situation to ensure an administrator was appointed to Fitzroy in order to fulfil their "strategic" direction of strengthening the northern clubs. No consideration was given by the AFL to either the wishes of the Fitzroy directors or the Fitzroy supporters who would have liked an opportunity to watch their supported team more than five times a year. In the end Nauru assigned their debt to the Brisbane Bears who held it for three years over Fitzroy like a sword of Damocles, until Alan Piper removed it.

During and since the late 80s Fitzroy supporters have been repeatedly betrayed by the AFL, the other clubs and the Brisbane Lions administration. Oakley's book is just the latest attempt to whitewash what the AFL did to force the club out of the competition.

The real phoenix is located down at the Brunswick Street Oval as the almost dead Fitzroy Football Club continues its rebuild and revival.
 
Roylion said:
Errr.. You do realise those Geelong comments were from ten years ago. Like 2004.
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Of course. That's what makes them funny IN HINDSIGHT.

If I had've replied in 2004 I would have probably said 'yeah well...dammit'.

My point stands. I love Fitzroy. I watched them live the other weekend and I live in Canberra. Somebody dogged a whole club because of one idiot and that pisses people off. It's a lesson that is as valid today as it was 10 years ago. We are on BigFooty! HELLO! The stoopid runs thick and fast. I see that kind of stupidity on BigFooty every day. I'll call it out every time, and especially when in hindsight it looks even more embarassing.

I could take what that guy did and proceed to make fun of Fitzroy. I won't, partly because I support Fitzroy, but most importantly because I understand the difference between an individual and an organisation.

You want to rebuild a club. Reach out to people; don't stomp on their toys because they'll want to stomp on yours. They'll make the same mistake that the original poster made. They'll take shots at a whole club for the actions of one idiot. It's damaging and I won't stand for it when it comes to things I support. So yeah, I'll call people out as a lesson because from what I see it's a lesson that needs repeating many many many more times.
 
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Kidd Vicious said:
What's the end goal mate? Is it a VFL team?
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Depending on what happens with the VFL in the future (with the advancement of stand alone AFL reserves teams and the profitability of the league) I think that would be a great end goal (considering Fitzroy started in the VFA) but it's very expensive to run a VFL team.

Also, have to keep in mind the history of the University Reds as well. I'm not sure how that plays in and what that side thinks about everything and wants.

I think dominating the VAFA and building the club operations is probably the main game for a very very long time.
 
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