Stynes: Dees always did their best

Jim Stynes watches on during an AFL match between Melbourne and Carlton. Picture: Alex Coppel. Source: Herald Sun

MELBOURNE is expected to strongly reject allegations that it deliberately lost games in 2009, arguing that it never participated in "tanking" as defined under AFL guidelines.

Former Melbourne president Jim Stynes, who died in March, was asked about the 2009 tanking allegations while he and I were co-writing his autobiography, My Journey, towards the end of 2011.

He was adamant there was no strategy to lose matches, saying: "Melbourne never sat down our coach Dean Bailey and instructed him not to win games". Stynes was frustrated about the tanking accusations, asking: "What is tanking?

"It's a really difficult one because sometimes when you put together the team, you put the best players that you can on the ground and then some people will say, 'Oh, you're not playing these players'. So that's tanking, right?

"But sometimes we sack players because their attitude is not good or they're not listening. They might be playing well but they are not playing the way they can play. (We tell them) 'This is the way we need you to play to be part of the team, this is the role or the position we want you to play, not that way'. Otherwise you end up teaching them bad habits.

"So is that tanking? Well that's not tanking because that's saying to the group that this player needs a lesson or needs to go. You have to choose because sometimes they need to play that role in the twos before they can come back again."

AFL Regulation 19(A5) defines tanking as "a person, being a player, coach or assistant coach, must at all times perform on their merits and must not induce, or encourage, any player, coach or assistant coach not to perform on their merits in any match - or in relation to any aspect of the match, for any reason whatsoever."

That definition will be closely scrutinised by Melbourne's legal team, which includes vice-president Guy Jalland, a legal counsel for Publishing and Broadcasting Limited from 2004-07.

Stynes was Melbourne president when the Demons were alleged to have underperformed in the second half of 2009, and when club officials are alleged to have met to discuss strategies to "forfeit matches". It coincided with his cancer diagnosis (June), major surgery (early July) and recovery in Thailand (July-August).

His first game back was Melbourne's 63-point win over Fremantle in Round 20, and he wrote in his diary: "We had the biggest win in 3 years and it felt awesome. It was great to be back passionate again about this great club and these terrific people. This makes it all worthwhile."

Stynes was critical of the AFL's special assistance rules for effectively providing lowly clubs with a disincentive to win games. By winning no more than four games in 2009, the Demons were guaranteed a priority pick (No.1) in that year's national draft.

"People at the club found themselves shrouded in that reality," he wrote. "It went against the grain for each of us to find solace in failure, but that was the system."

Stynes said ladder position "doesn't necessarily reflect how good or bad your team is", and was in favour of a more holistic examination of clubs.

"The number of games you win and lose should be one component and then the way you run your football club or the numbers; the amount of people supporters you get, you know, what you are able to generate - all those things should come into it.

"The AFL could then use its judgment or a broader set of guidelines to award a priority pick. But it certainly shouldn't set a target before a season and give a club a disincentive to win."

Editorial, Page 28

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