CATS WENT TO AFL FOR KELLY SUPPORT
GEELONG tried “absolutely everything” to keep star midfielder Tim Kelly, including pitching to the AFL for assistance outside the salary cap.
Kelly finally had his wish granted on Wednesday when Geelong traded him to West Coast in a deal that gave the Cats their best draft hand since the 2001 super draft that set up the club’s premiership dynasty.
Cats chief executive Brian Cook said yesterday the club asked for concessions to help support the Kelly family, who have two children with autism.
The Cats are well regarded for their welfare and have several player development managers to look after the needs of their list.
Collingwood, Hawthorn and Richmond have also fought to have welfare spending removed from the football department soft cap in recent years, so that clubs can dedicate more resources to welfare without being taxed for the extra spending.
A major factor in Kelly’s decision to return home to Western Australia after two seasons at Geelong was to be surrounded by family and a better support network to help his children.
His cousin relocated from Perth to Geelong this year to help provide him and his partner, Caitlin Miller, with support with his children’s development, who need weekly speech therapy and occupational therapy sessions.
Under AFL rules, there are restrictions on how much clubs can spend on additional services for their players before it counts towards the salary cap.
For instance, under Kelly’s Geelong contract and the collective bargaining agreement, his relatives were only allowed a set amount of return flights to Perth outside the club’s salary cap.
The strict restrictions cost their families a “small fortune” in flights in 2018 as Kelly and Miller settled into life on the other side of the country.
“Goodness, I think we tried everything,” Cook said on SEN.
“We tried absolutely everything and I don’t think we could have done more. I won’t go through all the measures we did, but I don’t think we could have done any more.
“If I could just mention one thing that we tried to do, we tried to get assistance outside the cap for the family.
“Unfortunately the Kellys have two children who are autistic and need unbelievable support and assistance, and we tried to work around the AFL in terms of getting some compensation.
“We eventually couldn’t get that. The AFL wouldn’t allow that, which I felt wasn’t in the interests of the game or him or anyone really. The only thing we could have done better was to get some more dollars to do more things to help them in more ways.”