Report sheds light on Dons drama
ESSENDON’S supplements regime architect Stephen Dank was described as an “unguided missile” in the neverbefore-seen review of the club’s 2012 drugs program by Dr Ziggy Switkowski.
The report into the Bombers’ injections scheme paints a picture of a dysfunctional organisation desperate to return to its former glory.
But nobody was held ultimately responsible for the illfated program in nuclear scientist and former Telstra boss Dr Switkowski’s secret 21page review. Chief executive Ian Robson came in for the most acute criticism.
The report was relied on by the AFL to charge four club officials — coach James Hird, assistant coach Mark “Bomber” Thompson, club doctor Bruce Reid and football manager Danny Corcoran — with bringing the game into disrepute. Dr Switkowski was commissioned to write it by Bombers chairman David Evans three weeks after the club “self-reported” its supplements regime to the AFL and the Australian Sports AntiDoping Authority on February 5, 2013. But only a condensed executive summary of the report was ever released, in May 2013. Among the key findings of the full report, Dr Switkowski said: “IF [fitness boss] Dean Robinson was the weapon, Stephen Dank was an unguided missile.” HIRD’S “playing days could not have prepared him for the environment he took over … lacking confidence, organisational clarity, good discipline and agreed objectives — and with potentially rogue personnel in the system”. THOMPSON “appeared unpersuaded of the merits of supplements in general”. THE board discussed risk management at a meeting in June 2012 but “WADA codes etc were not mentioned”. ROBSON was remote from the football operations which he should have been across, instead obsessing over the club’s new training facility.
Regarding the failings of the Evans-led board, Dr Switkowski said: “Board members must exercise due diligence to ensure compliance and player welfare.”
Confusion reigned under the new sports science team, as “after Robinson and Dank arrived, nothing was ever straightforward again”, he said.
At one stage, Dr Switkowski said Thompson “tore shreds off Dank” in order to reinforce Hird’s direction for the need to be compliant with doping regulations.
Another club figure told Dr Switkowski: “James gets what he wants; Bomber Thompson does what he wants.”
But in a key failure, “an assumption was made that his [Hird’s] instructions would be followed to the letter”.
A group seeking the establishment of a fresh inquiry into the Bombers doping saga yesterday said the Dr Switkowski report was a “whitewash” that “enabled the AFL to destroy James Hird and exonerate itself and the Essendon board”.