AFL TO BLAME FOR SNUBBING

IT is not economics or parochialism stopping Tasmania having an AFL team, but the AFL.

Scott Wade, a former Hawthorn and Tasmanian State of Origin rover, was AFL Tasmania’s chief executive for almost 17 years, and has been a strong advocate for the state’s entry into the big league.

All sorts of reasons and excuses have been given as to why the state has been overlooked, but Wade, pictured, said they were hogwash.

“I have been saying consistently is if the AFL Commission wanted Tasmania to have a team, we’d have one tomorrow,” he said.

“You can skirt around the edges, but the AFL Commission don’t want Tasmania to have a team.”

Wade said league HQ was supportive of Tasmanian football during his time in charge.

“But they have never really been prepared to address the elephant in the room [a Tasmanian AFL team],” he said. “[Former AFL chief executive] Andrew Demetriou was really clear and concise under his reign. They were going towards two teams in NSW and Queensland, and Tassie was the next cab off the rank.

“But I haven’t seen any evidence that the current AFL Commission is one bit interested in Tassie being the next cab off the rank.”

He was in charge when the code was governed by an independent board, which included Richmond chief executive Brendon Gale and multiple AFL club recruiting guru Scott Clayton. But in April 2015 the board dissolved itself and handed control to the AFL as was the set up in other states.

Less than a year later Wade was shown the door.

He was replaced by Rob Auld, who was promoted to AFL House after less than two years with the game in a crisis as Devonport and Burnie withdrew from the state league, and then Trisha Squires, who moved to become head of AFL Queensland after a tumultuous 2½ years in charge.

“I was forced out because they didn’t want anyone leading Tasmanian football who wanted to

passionately fight for Tasmania,” said Wade, the father of Test batsman Matthew and uncle of Collingwood star Jeremy Howe.

“They wanted a person who would toe the corporate line.”

He said the contracts that brought Hawthorn and North Melbourne to Tasmania to play home games have done nothing for the growth of the game, in fact, it has gone immeasurably backwards since the Hawks first home game in Launceston in 2001.

Wade believes Tasmania and the AFL missed opportunities in the late 1980s when the competition expanded to include West Coast and the Brisbane Bears, and again in the early 1990s with Fitzroy playing home games in Hobart in a last ditch at survival before being forced north to merge with the Bears after the 1996 season.

He said a Tasmanian AFL team would reinvigorate the code in the state, bringing the same passion and pride as West and South Australians feel for the Eagles, Dockers, Crows and Power, and have the same impact on the state that Geelong does in its region. But he believes without one, Tasmanian football would continue to spiral downwards.

“Community club footy will survive, clubs are resilient, but it just won’t be of any quality,” he said. “All of our young talent will basically end up on the mainland. Those who are pursuing an AFL dream will go elsewhere and we will never see them again back in the state.

“The AFL has sucked the talent out of Tasmania and given nothing back.”