Season 2016 - early days

[justabaraker]

Sorry if I didn't make myself clear FB.

I don't doubt for a minute that NEAFL players are on that sort of money...apart from their footy skills, they need to be compensated for the time and inconvenience involved in playing NEAFL. There are horrifying stories going around of the hardships those guys have endured (and the support staff) .
And I'm sure that some of the Baulko guys had NEAFL contracts that had to be paid for last year, even though the doggie doos had hit the fan.

[Coastal Boy]

Assuming ECE players had NEAFL contracts for 2015 which had to be honoured.
Assuming ECE asked to receive their NEAFL grant for 2015 under the guise that they had players under contract for 2015.
Why didn't the Sydney AFL tell ECE they cannot keep NEAFL level players to play in the local competition.
Why didn't the Sydney AFL ask for a list of players under contract. They could have then contacted each player and asked if they wanted their contract to be honoured the Sydney AFL would pay but they could be sent to any Sydney AFL club under a ballot system. If they choose to rescind their current contract they can opt out of the ballot and play for anyone(including ECE).

Lots of assumptions here. Is their any substance to the first few points?

[justabaraker]

We may never know the answers to these questions - in fact, there is a lot to this story that hasn't come out (and I don't know much myself).
But I'm happy to know that Baulko choked in the GF, against opposition that wasn't too skillful but had loads of enthusiasm and stayed disciplined and focussed.
And I'm happy that Manly or St George could easily have won the GF against Baulko if they had a bit more discipline in the lead-up finals so that they could be at the Big Dance. Baulko was probably fourth-best finals team as it turned out.
And I'm happy that the playing field is now level so Baulko can compete on their merits, and serve up salmon at their home games.

And I'm tipping that the mandarins in GHQ won't be having much to add, either.

It's all history, Baulko won't be saying anything. Let's look ahead to a new season.

[Tim Freedman]

Footy Barista - you are talking rubbish. I can categorically advise you that Stubbs wasn't paid anywhere near that amount of money. Not even close. Considering I signed him and he also worked for me I think I would know!

I can also confirm that no player on the list last year was paid their "so called" NEAFL contract. In fact, not one player even asked for that to be the case.

There's a lot of banter on this forum that I'm happy to contribute to quite often. But trying to pass things off as "facts" is ludicrous,

[saviour01]

Tim, you seem to be in the know so maybe you can answer this since everyone else seems to avoid it. Where did the afl money go?

[Pmcc2911]

The title of this thread is 2016 - Early Days, lets move on.
How are the Saints going to go they have a young list starting to get some experience now.
Penno have a strong club all the way through to u/17's, if get don't stuff things up they could be a force for the next 10 years.

[Coastal Boy]

Footy Barista - you are talking rubbish. I can categorically advise you that Stubbs wasn't paid anywhere near that amount of money. Not even close. Considering I signed him and he also worked for me I think I would know!

I can also confirm that no player on the list last year was paid their "so called" NEAFL contract. In fact, not one player even asked for that to be the case.

There's a lot of banter on this forum that I'm happy to contribute to quite often. But trying to pass things off as "facts" is ludicrous,

I'm just trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together.
Correct me if I'm wrong.

Assumed Fact: East Coast found themselves in a little financial bother.
Assumed Fact: They received some money from an AFL body, some or all of it has to be repaid.
Assumed Fact: Many of the NEAFL players from at ECE in 2014 stayed and played in the Sydney AFL in 2015.

So lets hypothesize:
Theory: No AFL body has ever given one red cent to a club they did not have to. So maybe the ECE NEAFL contract extended into 2015 so the AFL decided to honour the contract but allow them to play in the SydneyAFL rather than force them to play NEAFL and watch it get messy.
Theory: How did ECE keep many NEAFL players for 2015 despite a cash crisis. It makes no sense to get a loan to get you out of trouble and then spend up big on players the same year. Surely you would go back into your shell for a year or 2, clear your debt, then embark on a premiership tilt. This obviously didnt happen.So assuming the players didn't play for nothing, maybe they were already contracted for 2015. ECE received the NEAFL grant under the guise that they had contracted players and so kept them and used the grant to pay them.
Theory: so how did ECE get a loan from a financial institution or the AFL? I cant work that one out. Only that Oscar is a great salesman or a genius or both.(Or he put his own money up)

Until I hear a better theory (or even the facts) ......

[Tim Freedman]

Coastal Boy. A few things to help you hypothesize.

Fact 1 - ECE lost 13 (yes 13) of their best 25 players when they exited the NEAFL at the end of 2014. Some returned home to their original state of residence, some retired and some joined other clubs in the NEAFL and Syd AFL. I'm happy to name them if needed and you can check against our NEAFL years.

Fact 2 - the players who chose to stay all made a decision to stay for the right reasons and to help the club recover from a tough few years. The culture at the club was the best it had been in many many years. The only thing ECE "sold" the players was for them to stick together and have a good year. The leadership group lead by Jon Vlatko was instrumental in getting the players to stick around. Their player expenditure for the year was the lowest it had been close to ten years. If you become a fully paid up member you can get a copy of the financials. Feel free to sign up.

Fact 3 - 2015 was funded by ECE on the back of the work done by the very best committee / board I have seen in over 20 years of senior football. Their ability to go out and raise money through new sponsors was unbelievable. Hell, they even came up with the genius idea to sell the naming rights to the ground and received approval from council. Not an easy thing to do.

The club was lucky to survive and if it wasn't for the work of the board lead by Pete Physick, Jon Gawley, Rod Frost, Richard Lee, Chris Baddock, Dave Arndt, Trev Hangan and Paul Meyer then they may have gone under. These people deserve huge recognition in my opinion for their selfless efforts.

Whilst ECE didn't win the flag, we considered the year to be a success off the field and this was ultimately how we measured ourselves. On the field we were beaten by a very good side who played well on the day when it mattered. We congratulated them and have moved on.

The competition will get stronger this year as each club recruits and their younger players gain more experience. ECE are looking forward to a new challenge.

[saviour01]

So your saying you guys got no afl money?

- - - Updated - - -

If thats the case let us know, because a lot of the discussion is around why afl gave you guys money and no one else. If its untrue then we can drop it. Until then we can just laugh that you guys were the only one and still couldnt win.

[Bingo Peter]

Guys happy knew year and all that jazz. interestig read catching up on all the recent discushoins on who pays what for SFL clubs to be competative in todays ultra competative markets and how much that money is funded by the main AFL body etc etc etc. As someone who has personelly dontaed a bit off money local clubs its not hard to see why the waters are gettting so muddyed when NEFL clubs are coming back to compete.
Its interesting if the sums thrown a round form sum NEFL playes are correct as i have on occasion recived up to $300 a game plus petrol money to play in leagues that may not be the same standard of the NEFL but definately wear the top clubs in those leaguse (EFL and Ammos in Victoria) could easliy compte and beat most of the current crop of NEFL clubs, but i guess the exposure to the swans, iants lions and suns not as much and the people are younger genarlly than the Vic leagues so have less people tin there familys to support

[Oscar]

It appears that half a dozen or so regular contributors to this site consider that the East Coast Eagles have received preferential assistance from the football world. And also believe that everything they hear (and then post) is factual.

The comments and accusations are quite inflammatory and have got to the point where a response is now appropriate from the Club. As President of the Eagles once again since the NEAFL debacle, I?m happy to provide it.

Firstly if any of you had taken the time to read the East Coast Year Book which has been published on-line at http://eastcoasteagles.com.au/wp-con...Book-Final.pdf since November 4th 2015, it may have answered many of your questions. Or if you had accepted our open invitation to attend our last two AGMs [yes we would have allowed you to be present], then along with dozens of Eagles? Members you would have seen and heard for yourself exactly how the club was rescued from the brink of disaster and precisely what it faced financially if it folded, or was to continue as an on-going concern.

Andreww1 raised the subject of signed Confidentiality Agreements being in existence. He is correct; there are two. Both relate to matters of how the Eagles got themselves into the mess they did during its three years in the NEAFL. The subject of these Agreements will remain exactly that. Confidential. Australian law does not permit the signatories (and I am one of them) to publicly or privately discuss anything pertaining to these Agreements.

However just how the present Board of Directors, members, players and supporters salvaged the ruins and turned the club around inside 18 months is available for public consumption. And to be honest we are very proud of what we have achieved.

At its peak the Club was $440,000 in debt in July 2014 when the (then NEAFL) Board was asked to resign, with external creditors banging at the door. A commercial loan repayable over 10 years was negotiated for an amount 66% less than the aforementioned figure. Where that loan was secured from is a matter for the lender to divulge, if it chooses to do so.

100% of this loan was used to settle as much of the urgent debt as possible. We did not include player payments as urgent debt, but assured each contracted player they would receive every dollar owed to them from their 2014 NEAFL contracts. To their eternal credit every player understood and accepted our position.

Some creditors were paid in full, whilst others were prepared to accept long term payment arrangements after the precise position the club found itself in was explained to them. These ongoing regular re-payments, including the commercial loan, are being made from new income generated after July 2014 by an extremely diligent new Board of Directors. Newly earned income also covered all the outstanding 2014 NEAFL player payments which were paid in full before December 31st 2014.

Despite the opinions expressed in this Forum, the AFL funding for NEAFL participation stopped promptly at the end of the 2014 season. Nor did the Eagles have to honour those NEAFL contracts which extended into 2015. It?s an interesting approach to be open and transparent with people who matter. And players matter. As Tim Freedman said earlier (and believe me he would know), not one former NEAFL player who chose to remain with East Coast debated our vastly reduced match payment offer to them for 2015. Including Trent Stubbs who has been signed by West Adelaide. I?m sure someone out there will know how much he is getting paid now though.....

Tim F forgot to mention that of those 12 ex NEAFL players who chose to stay at ECE, eight of them played in one or more of our Premiership sides back in 09, 10 & 11. To suggest they shouldn?t be permitted to continue to play for their own club is ludicrous in the extreme.

I don?t need to tell you this, but the 2015 AFL Sydney player budget was 80% less than the 2014 NEAFL budget. I?d like to think we?re not that irresponsible to maintain NEAFL payment levels in the AFL Sydney competition. And like every Sydney club has to do, our operating budget and all audited financials for 2015 have been submitted to the AFL for scrutiny and approval.

So where did all this new revenue come from? East Coast went out and found it from those wonderful new sponsors that spectators hear about when at Kanebridge Oval. Fantastic business people who have now partnered the Eagles for years to come and who deserve every bit of recognition we can give them. And you?ll keep hearing about them in future seasons, have no doubt.

These sponsors are on board again in 2016 with more to be announced. But sponsorship income alone is not enough to keep the club functioning, considering its long term debt commitments and (albeit significantly reduced) operating expenditure. The local promotion of the Eagles returning to community footy has been extensive. Ask anyone who attended our revamped Back to Baulko event. There were 2,000 people at the ground across the day, so it shouldn?t be too hard to find someone who was there.

Three brand new Kanebridge apartments were sold on that day which benefitted the club big time. And why not ask your club whether they have settled any NAB Introducer loans for housing finance lately? Your Treasurer might be surprised just how much income this brings in. The canteen at Kanebridge in 2015 generated an extraordinary $40,000 in turnover. It certainly helps when you promote yourselves and people come along to the footy and enjoy well cooked quality food.

Lastly a comment to Coastal Boy. I am flattered that you think I may have bank rolled the recovery of the Eagles. It?s an interesting observation. More interesting than you might imagine, but it?s not true. The recovery is totally due to everyone associated with our footy club. They have been exceptional and we stand in good stead from all angles. We have long term debt for the next nine years, but it?s been made extremely manageable by some very good people who turned a major loss into an operating profit.

The last 18 months have been all about survival. As I said in the Year Book, we had no on field objectives at all in 2015. Our only mission was getting the footy club back to a position where it would still be there for future generations.

I hope this post is the last you will hear from me on the subject, but I do give you one promise. All those anonymous people who have proposed myths and legend on this Message Board about East Coast are more than welcome to identify yourself to me at the footy one day and I?ll happily buy you a beer and debate the last 18 months with you.

Pete Physick
President
East Coast Eagles Football Club

[Norris Lurker]

I was going to take a step back from this forum after the Grand Final, and wrote so on the Grand Final match report. Haven't been around much since then, and a lot's been said on here unchecked. In other circumstances the thread probably would have been locked several pages ago.....

A lot about the Eagles - times were tough after they pulled out of the NEAFL. It would have been a tragedy for footy if the Eagles had folded, but survival looks more likely now than it did a year or so ago. They had a strong team with plenty of their NEAFL players in 2015, and despite going down in the Grand Final had a strong season. Every club loses some players over off-seasons for all sorts of reasons, and the Eagles will be no exception, but I'm sure they'll be up there at the business end of 2016.

[saviour01]

Decent reply. However a question i get from that and probably one tim f can answer... do wages and bonuses show in your financial figures for the players that work for your sponsors?

[tara]

Decent reply. However a question i get from that and probably one tim f can answer... do wages and bonuses show in your financial figures for the players that work for your sponsors?

Do they at st george
Ive provided employment for between 20-30 people at out club over the past 10 years. Should i de declaring that

[Norris Lurker]

There's no salary cap or ban on third party payments. If it's not the club directly employing them, there's no reason why it would be in the club's books or why the club would have to disclose it.