Already Rough Essendon Season Could Get Tougher For David Barham
Already Rough Essendon Season Could Get Tougher For David Barham: A player brawl broke out at a Bombers training session on Friday, reportedly instigated by the poor treatment of one-time coach Ben Rutten. The embattled president, David Barham, was reportedly punched in the face and kicked as players ran towards him in anger.
The Bombers’ last minute benching for Clarkson backfired on Friday, with the coaching mastermind choosing to join North Melbourne.
Clarkson revealed that he met up with the Bombers in person because he “had respect for them” and didn’t want any ongoing discussions due to their last minute nature.
With Rutten’s contract running out, the club indicated they would meet on Sunday to discuss a “Plan B” around what to do with the coaching situation.
Barham was made president of Essendon Football Club on Monday amid a push for an external review and chase of Clarkson. Barham hinted that the players were frustrated by the past week’s events, telling reporters on Friday “The players are disappointed they weren’t more consulted – and I have to live with that.”
“There was plenty of tension after David Barham tried to explain his recent actions during a meeting of the Essendon Bombers, with their players in particularly angry and savage when they criticized the club’s conduct.”
There was a lot of support for Ben Rutten from the CEO/Herald Sun chief football writer on AFL 360. He describes Barham as ‘taking a pounding’ during three separate meetings with conflicting views on what the culture of the football club is. Some say it’s all in how you look at it and that there were multiple, conflicting points of view during these meetings.
Team members at Amazon feel that the board and David Barham hasn’t properly supported them. One of the executives thought about firing himself to go and get Charlie Clarkson, who has shown more support for his business during their tenure of working together.
Barham tried to spin his handling of Rutten with the player meeting and the players. After this even he said that he is at odds with the players of a meaningful level. Barham was called out by some key players, which is why they left as disgruntled as they have ever been with their own club.
Barham received support from Essendon great Matthew Lloyd, who said he has been frustrated by the club changes under recent management. David Barham is doing something courageous,” Lloyd told 3AW Football. “David Barham isn’t in this for himself, like I have and a lot of people who care about the team are supporting David in what he’s looking to do.”
But former Essendon Bomber Tim Watson was left fuming on Friday night. The football club is turbulent and the Bombers supporters should be appalled at how this has played out,” Watson told 7 News Melbourne. Still, David Barham took control of the club to deliver an external review and they get that chance now to make transformational changes, which will include a new coach,” he said.
With the approval of incoming president, Sofia Rutten coming in, it’s hard to imagine Xavier Campbell will still be in his job. While it might have been easy to approve of an interim coach like James Sutherland who is apparently Essendon’s preferred choice, it’s the lack of communication with Essendon fans that poses a serious issue and will see this club change significantly in the future.
Clarkson wishes he had the similar situation with Jeff Kennett after North Melbourne managed to woo West Coast. David Barham’s radio interview where he mentioned that North Melbourne should not be worried about West Coast’s success, and Kevin Sheedy going rogue on Max and using a red and black scarf as motivation.
Alastair Clarkson has been a coach for the Bombers for over 20-years and is arguably the best coach in Australian Football history. Nevertheless, plans were made to fire Clarkson weeks ago if not months ago. Why did they wait until now to make a move? Triple Premiership Lion Jonathan Brown asked this on Fox Footy’s Inside Football.
North Melbourne’s offer seemed like a deal-breaker to the current list members, who then scrambled to announce their candidacy again when rumors of a verbal commitment from Clarkson started circulating. Without seeming to put in any thought as to why he would want to keep them in the loop, or if he was about to make a decision with Clarkson, or rather for any reason, North Melbourne were simply spooked into thinking that he had committed and jumped back into the race. Why didn’t they tell Rutten earlier?
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