No Opposition Supporters CAS hands down guilty verdict - Players appealing - Dank shot - no opposition - (cont in pt.2)

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mxett

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Can anyone list a few point from this article please. It doesn't open for me.
  • ONE of Australia’s most respected sports physicians may hold the key to whether 34 current and former Essendon footballers are found guilty of taking a banned peptide during the club’s ill-fated season 2012 supplements regime.

  • Doctor Peter Fricker, a former director of the Australian Institute of Sport and one of three witnesses ASADA will call to support its case that Essendon footballers were given the banned peptide Thymosin Beta-4, has provided a sworn statement about his dealings with sports scientist Stephen Dank in 2012.
  • Dank told The Australian that during a meeting in April 2012, Fricker expressed interest in the work Dank was doing at Essendon with Thymomodulin, an immunity-boosting thymosin peptide permitted for use by the World Anti-Doping Agency. According to Dank, Fricker told him: “It is good to see someone is starting to understand immunology and exercise.’’
 

rumply

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  • ONE of Australia’s most respected sports physicians may hold the key to whether 34 current and former Essendon footballers are found guilty of taking a banned peptide during the club’s ill-fated season 2012 supplements regime.
  • Doctor Peter Fricker, a former director of the Australian Institute of Sport and one of three witnesses ASADA will call to support its case that Essendon footballers were given the banned peptide Thymosin Beta-4, has provided a sworn statement about his dealings with sports scientist Stephen Dank in 2012.
  • Dank told The Australian that during a meeting in April 2012, Fricker expressed interest in the work Dank was doing at Essendon with Thymomodulin, an immunity-boosting thymosin peptide permitted for use by the World Anti-Doping Agency. According to Dank, Fricker told him: “It is good to see someone is starting to understand immunology and exercise.’’

Seems obvious that Fricker will testify that his discussions with Dank were about TB4, not Thymomodulin as Dank claims, or why else would ASADA be using him. & apparently Dank will not be around to testify as to his side of the story.

Now or never Danky boy, now or never...
 

Dan Cooper

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Chip Le Grand provided an excellent summary, and then lead-in to the case on SEN only minutes ago. Still seems to be of a firm view the players will be found not guilty.

"Varying narratives provided by the various parties." Sure I also heard Le Grand say Charter spent a full week (or was it two weeks?) speaking with ASADA.

ASADA, Essendon and the AFL will all be represented at the tribunal. ASADA by Malcolm Holmes. Essendon by David Grace, and the AFL by Jeff Gleeson.

The consent form the players signed provided an assurance what they would be administered was safe and permitted for use by WADA.
 
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Dan Cooper

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fishardansin

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That...

A) How can Hird really be not in the chain of command and have no responsibility at all when the forms they signed prevented them talking to anyone about the program outside of Hird, Reid, Robinson and Dank? Yes, technically Hamilton should've had oversight of Robinson/Dank but the fact is he didn't, Hird did. The bulk of communications quite clearly show that.

B) The attempt from Francis to say the only reason Hird is charged was because of the use of [] is crap. Did Thompson too have his name in brackets? The brackets added or subtracted nothing to the AFL's ultimate finding/sanction. And I have no idea what the hell Downes has to do with it either.
Thompson being charged was simply a way of the AFL trying to keep pressure on Hird and trying to drive a wedge between him and everyone it could. The AFL leaders have definitely studied Deadwood and Boardwalk Empire.
 

rumply

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& the lols keep coming
http://www.news.com.au/sport/afl/ex...lks-with-bombers/story-fndv8gad-1227155930052

Exclusive: Star witness Charter in talks with Bombers
THE anti-doping watchdog’s star witness has sensationally turned on the agency by holding secret talks with lawyers for the Essendon players.

In a stunning twist, Shane Charter has met Tony Hargreaves to discuss potential weaknesses in the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority’s case against the Bombers.

ASADA v ESSENDON: EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW

CHARTER CAN’T BE FORCED TO TESTIFY

SECRET EMAIL SHOWS ASADA’S JOB LURE

Charter made no apologies, saying: “I am neither ASADA’s witness nor Essendon’s.”

The long-awaited AFL tribunal hearing into allegations 34 current and former Bombers took a banned drug starts today. It will proceed without Charter and another key witness, Nima Alavi, after ASADA lawyers failed to convince the Supreme Court the pair could be subpoenaed.

The pair has given evidence to ASADA but refuses to testify. But in an interview with the Herald Sun, Charter said he did not consider himself an ASADA witness and saw no reason why he should not help the players.


Shane Charters arrives at court. Picture: Nicole Garmston Source: News Corp Australia



“I’m not ASADA’s witness, I was merely providing information,” he said.

“Tony Hargreaves has had the opportunity to discuss some issues that were unclear and also to clarify the chronology of the peptides ordered.

“There were a number of flaws in ASADA’s case and it was going to be hard for him to fill in the gaps if I wasn’t turning up.”

Charter agreed to speak with the lawyers after he was approached.

Asked if he’d been paid to stop co-operating with ASADA, he said: “God no, that would be a bigger scandal than the original one.”

ASADA believed it had Charter’s co-operation until late November.

But the biochemist spent two hours with Hargreaves and Essendon chief executive Xavier Campbell on November 7. The discussion was recorded and transcribed and a further phone talk took place last week while Charter was on the Gold Coast.

The 50-page transcript could form part of the defence submission. Hargreaves declined to comment.

Lawyers for the players have reportedly considered opening today’s proceedings by arguing the players have no case to answer.

But ASADA is confident they do, and believe their case is solid, following a painstaking two-year probe.

ASADA alleges sports scientist Stephen Dank gave players the banned drug thymosin beta-4. But the players believe they had been given a permitted form of thymosin.

carly.crawford@news.com.au

Originally published as Star witness Charter in talks with Bombers
 

fishardansin

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Surely if the Footy Department was, 1) massively increasing footy dept expenditure, 2) Implementing a cutting edge sports science program that the Board would be formally notified through their line managers.
It is very likely that Hird and Evans were told that this AOD is part of the program and there is an investment opportunity in it as well. This could all be with the understanding that it was AOK according to ASADA.
 

Mercurial89

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That...

A) How can Hird really be not in the chain of command and have no responsibility at all when the forms they signed prevented them talking to anyone about the program outside of Hird, Reid, Robinson and Dank? Yes, technically Hamilton should've had oversight of Robinson/Dank but the fact is he didn't, Hird did. The bulk of communications quite clearly show that.

B) The attempt from Francis to say the only reason Hird is charged was because of the use of [] is crap. Did Thompson too have his name in brackets? The brackets added or subtracted nothing to the AFL's ultimate finding/sanction. And I have no idea what the hell Downes has to do with it either.
Id say it probably just shows further why even though the clubs organisational structure was in theory sound (in that a matrix structure is perfectly viable) it was not the right way to go about running a Football club/supplement program. I think the stories we heard about Hird's aura would play into it here where he may not have been involved in certain things or been a part of the chain of command, but because of who he was the club may have revolved around him blurring the lines for that which he was responsible for.

Thats not really the "fault" of Hird or the club, it was a weakness, (it happens when people are viewed in a certain way) the problem being that weakness helped the absolutely perfect storm of events occur. One arguement ive seen on here, and one even ive subscribed to is that this type of program was being run at other clubs. The thing with that is no other club would have had the personalities and other events that we would have had.
Such as-
- Hird - Someone that through no real fault of his own was worshipped and even though not responsible seemed to want to be involved in everything. Not really a bad thing, however when you are worshipped and you get involved in an area where you shouldnt really be, people may mistake you for someone in charge, allows miscomunication.

- Horribly out of touch fitness- No team were as far behind the 8 ball as we were, with an absolute need to "get with the times"we bit off more than we could chew

- Thompson - The man was the main reference for Robinson (not his fault) which opened us up to bringing in someone that may not have been properly vetted for the role.

- Robinson - Highly qualified Fitness coach however it seems not great at a manager's role. Over his head

- Corcoran & Robson - two people performing the same role.
 

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BrunoV

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Will say that Francis' theory of a matrix organisation is well argued and articulated in absolving Hird of responsibility. My only concern is that Francis later posts about the potential investment meeting in AOD attended by Evans and Hird . It's disingenous to say Hird had no organisational role and limited role in the provision of the supplement program. when Hird and Evans attended the meeting. Actually this also indicates that the Board had knowledge of the supplement program.


My response to this point is that you still need to look at Hird's role and identify why it was that he should have done more than sending an email setting some basic criteria for the program (i.e. legality, consent, etc), why he should have been checking records of administration, why he should have done background checks and otherwise monitored a program that he has neither the expertise to regulate nor the organisational responsibility for.

No doubt that Hird knew about the program. No doubt that he wanted and supported the program. It seems to me that Dank updating Hird on phases (in order to set training loads) is normal. It still dances around the key issues as far as I am concerned and I am yet to see anything that places Hird in a position where he as an individual was required to do more than he did. This says nothing about the broader administrative failures from within the football department (which I accept was a shambles).
 

Dan Cooper

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According to Chip Le Grand, the AFL will provide short, probably point form, summaries at the conclusion of each day of the hearing. I get the impression they will be very brief and probably tell us sweet FA.

Wouldn't you like to be a fly on the wall in that hearing.
 
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