ASADA will NOT appeal

[ossie85]

And after 5 years, how many players would actually still be playing?

They need to make the system quicker, so that in the case where you actually have dodgy players (not the Essendon ones), the players actually get penalised.

[jvalles69]

And after 5 years, how many players would actually still be playing?

They need to make the system quicker, so that in the case where you actually have dodgy players (not the Essendon ones), the players actually get penalised.

I reckon Dustin Fletcher might still be going around then!  ;D

[GCSkiwi]

I'm genuinely interested how many people actually believe that the players were not given banned performance enhancing drugs? I know it's a case of innocent until proven guilty but sheesh the circumstantial evidence in this case is pretty damning really...

1) There is no question that players were injected with some compound(s) in a regime that was purposefully hidden from the club doctor

2) This regime was overseen by Stephen Dank, who has been banned for life from involvement in the NRL after the Cronulla Sharks scandal where players were banned for taking PEDs. So he's not above giving them out to players.

3) Dank was also found guilty by the AFL Anti-doping tribunal of offences of "trafficking, attempting to traffick and complicity in matters related to a range of prohibited substances" list here: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2015-04-17/full-statement-from-afl-antidoping-tribunal-chairman

4) Essendon have no records of what players were given, and Dank will not turn over his records of what was given.

5) This isn't really evidence but doesn't look good in context - 2012 was the year of the soft tissue injury at Essendon. Muscle building PEDs increase risk of tendon/ligament injuries because the muscle is adapting and getting stronger faster than the tendons can cope.


So, if the whole thing was legit, why was it hidden from the doctor, why were records not kept by the club, and why does Dank not simply give over his records of all the legal things he dosed players with? I think at some point the accountability needs to shift to clubs to prove that what they are giving their players is legal, rather than forcing a relatively powerless antidoping body to prove unequivocally what was in their systems. That's actually insanely difficult to do. I agree that it's probably an AFL wide issue and I doubt Essendon are the only ones in the very dark side of the grey area, but that doesn't absolve them of responsibility. Players, coaches, managers, and club boards should all be much much smarter than what's on display here.

[RaisyDaisy]

Not sure if this has been posted before, but here are the 34 names

Jake Carlisle
Ariel Steinberg
Tayte Pears
Tom Bellchambers
Jobe Watson
David Myers
Michael Hurley
Alex Browne
Travis Colyer
Michael Hibberd
Jake Melksham
Dyson Heppell
Cale Hooker
Heath Hocking
Ben Howlett
Dustin Fletcher
Brent Stanton

Paddy Ryder
Angus Monfries
Stewart Crameri

Corey Dell’Olio
Alwyn Davey
Leroy Jetta
Luke Davis
Mark Mcveigh
Brent Prismall
Nathan Lovett-Murray
Ricky Dyson
Sam Lonergan
Kyle Hardingham
Scott Gumbleton
Brendan Lee
Henry Slattery
David Hille

[silloc]

I'm genuinely interested how many people actually believe that the players were not given banned performance enhancing drugs? I know it's a case of innocent until proven guilty but sheesh the circumstantial evidence in this case is pretty damning really...

1) There is no question that players were injected with some compound(s) in a regime that was purposefully hidden from the club doctor

2) This regime was overseen by Stephen Dank, who has been banned for life from involvement in the NRL after the Cronulla Sharks scandal where players were banned for taking PEDs. So he's not above giving them out to players.

3) Dank was also found guilty by the AFL Anti-doping tribunal of offences of "trafficking, attempting to traffick and complicity in matters related to a range of prohibited substances" list here: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2015-04-17/full-statement-from-afl-antidoping-tribunal-chairman

4) Essendon have no records of what players were given, and Dank will not turn over his records of what was given.

5) This isn't really evidence but doesn't look good in context - 2012 was the year of the soft tissue injury at Essendon. Muscle building PEDs increase risk of tendon/ligament injuries because the muscle is adapting and getting stronger faster than the tendons can cope.


So, if the whole thing was legit, why was it hidden from the doctor, why were records not kept by the club, and why does Dank not simply give over his records of all the legal things he dosed players with? I think at some point the accountability needs to shift to clubs to prove that what they are giving their players is legal, rather than forcing a relatively powerless antidoping body to prove unequivocally what was in their systems. That's actually insanely difficult to do. I agree that it's probably an AFL wide issue and I doubt Essendon are the only ones in the very dark side of the grey area, but that doesn't absolve them of responsibility. Players, coaches, managers, and club boards should all be much much smarter than what's on display here.

I think that was the whole point of not bothering with the other clubs. lets go after the one we have the best chance of proving, scape goat them, and hope it will scare all the other ones straight.

Despite the process having been ballzed up, I think they got their desired result.

[blue]

I'm genuinely interested how many people actually believe that the players were not given banned performance enhancing drugs? I know it's a case of innocent until proven guilty but sheesh the circumstantial evidence in this case is pretty damning really...

1) There is no question that players were injected with some compound(s) in a regime that was purposefully hidden from the club doctor

2) This regime was overseen by Stephen Dank, who has been banned for life from involvement in the NRL after the Cronulla Sharks scandal where players were banned for taking PEDs. So he's not above giving them out to players.

3) Dank was also found guilty by the AFL Anti-doping tribunal of offences of "trafficking, attempting to traffick and complicity in matters related to a range of prohibited substances" list here: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2015-04-17/full-statement-from-afl-antidoping-tribunal-chairman

4) Essendon have no records of what players were given, and Dank will not turn over his records of what was given.

5) This isn't really evidence but doesn't look good in context - 2012 was the year of the soft tissue injury at Essendon. Muscle building PEDs increase risk of tendon/ligament injuries because the muscle is adapting and getting stronger faster than the tendons can cope.


So, if the whole thing was legit, why was it hidden from the doctor, why were records not kept by the club, and why does Dank not simply give over his records of all the legal things he dosed players with? I think at some point the accountability needs to shift to clubs to prove that what they are giving their players is legal, rather than forcing a relatively powerless antidoping body to prove unequivocally what was in their systems. That's actually insanely difficult to do. I agree that it's probably an AFL wide issue and I doubt Essendon are the only ones in the very dark side of the grey area, but that doesn't absolve them of responsibility. Players, coaches, managers, and club boards should all be much much smarter than what's on display here.

I think that was the whole point of not bothering with the other clubs. lets go after the one we have the best chance of proving, scape goat them, and hope it will scare all the other ones straight.

Despite the process having been ballzed up, I think they got their desired result.

Kiwi I agree with everything you have pointed out but are you 2 implying that every club in the afl are illegal doping. I find this hard to believe, surly there would have been other players who have been delisted or retired by now that would of come out and stated that I have been injected with a unknown substance. It has just about got to the point where I hope the players get the 2 years just to punish the smoke and mirrors the club have put up, if they had just gone down the same path as the Sharks did in the nrl this whole situation would of been delt with years ago.

[Ziplock]

there was a huge number of clubs that were cited as having inadequate record keeping as well.

whether that means they were all doping or not... who knows.

personally, I'm pretty sure essendon were doing something dodgy. But there's no record, and I'm glad about that, since I don't think the players would have deserved their penalties.

[GCSkiwi]

Kiwi I agree with everything you have pointed out but are you 2 implying that every club in the afl are illegal doping. I find this hard to believe, surly there would have been other players who have been delisted or retired by now that would of come out and stated that I have been injected with a unknown substance. It has just about got to the point where I hope the players get the 2 years just to punish the smoke and mirrors the club have put up, if they had just gone down the same path as the Sharks did in the nrl this whole situation would of been delt with years ago.

I'm not implying that every club is illegally doping, what I meant when I said I doubted Essendon are the only ones on the dark side of the grey area is that in the world of professional sports, clubs/players/coaches will go to great lengths to get that extra 1% that could put them ahead. And sometimes the lengths they go to stray outside the lines of what is controlled or known. New supplements that companies are formulating, new recovery techniques still under research, new training paradigms to further optimise performance... These are all happening right now in every club, I would bet the house I don't own on it.

In terms of "were other clubs doing similar things to the Essendon injection regime", I honestly wouldn't be surprised. We don't know what the players were told they were getting, and there's plenty of legitimate things you could inject a player with. Whether or not it's totally necessary is another story, but again in the world of optimal performance you're looking for the best was to get the most effective dose of something to someone. Anything you eat gets processed by your gut and you lose stuff along the way, so even in the case of innocent things like vitamins, an injection is a better way to get them than eating. Is it necessary? Absolutely not in most cases. Some people may have a disorder that means they can't absord a particular vitamin or something like that which requires an intervention. Then there's things like anti-inflammatory injections etc etc. So there's heaps of things that players could have been given totally innocently, so why would now retired players come out and say "yeah every week I was given a shot of vitamin b12, I always thought that was a bit suspect..."?

I think Essendon was an extreme case. I find it difficult to believe that player suspicions can't have been roused. But there's a whole lot of other things going on out there - Saad got banned for taking a preworkout formula with a banned ingredient, but I can tell you right now as an absolute fact that there are new formulae being developed all the time which are not regulated, not tested, and totally competition legal - for now. Perfect example is the preworkout "Craze" which was banned and removed from shelves ~18 months ago after it was found that one of the ingredients was essentially methamphetamine. And this is not the first time something like that has happened, prior to that there was "Jack3d" and others which contained DMAA which again was essentially an amphetamine... Happened before, will happen again.

[blue]

Kiwi I agree with everything you have pointed out but are you 2 implying that every club in the afl are illegal doping. I find this hard to believe, surly there would have been other players who have been delisted or retired by now that would of come out and stated that I have been injected with a unknown substance. It has just about got to the point where I hope the players get the 2 years just to punish the smoke and mirrors the club have put up, if they had just gone down the same path as the Sharks did in the nrl this whole situation would of been delt with years ago.

I'm not implying that every club is illegally doping, what I meant when I said I doubted Essendon are the only ones on the dark side of the grey area is that in the world of professional sports, clubs/players/coaches will go to great lengths to get that extra 1% that could put them ahead. And sometimes the lengths they go to stray outside the lines of what is controlled or known. New supplements that companies are formulating, new recovery techniques still under research, new training paradigms to further optimise performance... These are all happening right now in every club, I would bet the house I don't own on it.

In terms of "were other clubs doing similar things to the Essendon injection regime", I honestly wouldn't be surprised. We don't know what the players were told they were getting, and there's plenty of legitimate things you could inject a player with. Whether or not it's totally necessary is another story, but again in the world of optimal performance you're looking for the best was to get the most effective dose of something to someone. Anything you eat gets processed by your gut and you lose stuff along the way, so even in the case of innocent things like vitamins, an injection is a better way to get them than eating. Is it necessary? Absolutely not in most cases. Some people may have a disorder that means they can't absord a particular vitamin or something like that which requires an intervention. Then there's things like anti-inflammatory injections etc etc. So there's heaps of things that players could have been given totally innocently, so why would now retired players come out and say "yeah every week I was given a shot of vitamin b12, I always thought that was a bit suspect..."?

I think Essendon was an extreme case. I find it difficult to believe that player suspicions can't have been roused. But there's a whole lot of other things going on out there - Saad got banned for taking a preworkout formula with a banned ingredient, but I can tell you right now as an absolute fact that there are new formulae being developed all the time which are not regulated, not tested, and totally competition legal - for now. Perfect example is the preworkout "Craze" which was banned and removed from shelves ~18 months ago after it was found that one of the ingredients was essentially methamphetamine. And this is not the first time something like that has happened, prior to that there was "Jack3d" and others which contained DMAA which again was essentially an amphetamine... Happened before, will happen again.

Point taken and respected, you clearly have a better understanding and knowledge of the sports science than I do. Just out of pure suspicion are you involved in sports science or maybe an athlete or ex athlete?

[silloc]

I'm genuinely interested how many people actually believe that the players were not given banned performance enhancing drugs? I know it's a case of innocent until proven guilty but sheesh the circumstantial evidence in this case is pretty damning really...

1) There is no question that players were injected with some compound(s) in a regime that was purposefully hidden from the club doctor

2) This regime was overseen by Stephen Dank, who has been banned for life from involvement in the NRL after the Cronulla Sharks scandal where players were banned for taking PEDs. So he's not above giving them out to players.

3) Dank was also found guilty by the AFL Anti-doping tribunal of offences of "trafficking, attempting to traffick and complicity in matters related to a range of prohibited substances" list here: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2015-04-17/full-statement-from-afl-antidoping-tribunal-chairman

4) Essendon have no records of what players were given, and Dank will not turn over his records of what was given.

5) This isn't really evidence but doesn't look good in context - 2012 was the year of the soft tissue injury at Essendon. Muscle building PEDs increase risk of tendon/ligament injuries because the muscle is adapting and getting stronger faster than the tendons can cope.


So, if the whole thing was legit, why was it hidden from the doctor, why were records not kept by the club, and why does Dank not simply give over his records of all the legal things he dosed players with? I think at some point the accountability needs to shift to clubs to prove that what they are giving their players is legal, rather than forcing a relatively powerless antidoping body to prove unequivocally what was in their systems. That's actually insanely difficult to do. I agree that it's probably an AFL wide issue and I doubt Essendon are the only ones in the very dark side of the grey area, but that doesn't absolve them of responsibility. Players, coaches, managers, and club boards should all be much much smarter than what's on display here.

I think that was the whole point of not bothering with the other clubs. lets go after the one we have the best chance of proving, scape goat them, and hope it will scare all the other ones straight.

Despite the process having been ballzed up, I think they got their desired result.

Kiwi I agree with everything you have pointed out but are you 2 implying that every club in the afl are illegal doping. I find this hard to believe, surly there would have been other players who have been delisted or retired by now that would of come out and stated that I have been injected with a unknown substance. It has just about got to the point where I hope the players get the 2 years just to punish the smoke and mirrors the club have put up, if they had just gone down the same path as the Sharks did in the nrl this whole situation would of been delt with years ago.

Essendon players were given lists of what they were "supposed" to be getting, that wasn't the problem. Stuart Crameri's mother stated she went through the whole list with a fine tooth comb and made sure they were all legal. Its the fact essendon have no records established enough to prove what it was.

So all the other clubs that weren't caught out, the players would have been none the wiser.

[silloc]

I guess I still see it as incompetent instead of dodgy, from the essendon football clubs perspective. The dank side of the argument is completely different.

[GCSkiwi]

Point taken and respected, you clearly have a better understanding and knowledge of the sports science than I do. Just out of pure suspicion are you involved in sports science or maybe an athlete or ex athlete?

Both :) Ex athlete now a science nerd, I research muscle adaptation but have a big interest in how different foods/supplements affect that process (though I don't get to research it myself).

Essendon players were given lists of what they were "supposed" to be getting, that wasn't the problem. Stuart Crameri's mother stated she went through the whole list with a fine tooth comb and made sure they were all legal. Its the fact essendon have no records established enough to prove what it was.

So all the other clubs that weren't caught out, the players would have been none the wiser.

Unless Crameri's mother directly contacted ASADA to enquire about everything on the list (which they encourage you to do if you aren't sure about something) then I don't think we can say she knew for sure they were legal... Google doesn't really cut it I'm afraid. Which does assume that she isn't herself a biochemist/physiologist which she may well be, but I still think she wouldn't know enough about anti-doping to really know.

I guess I still see it as incompetent instead of dodgy, from the essendon football clubs perspective. The dank side of the argument is completely different.

From a WADA perspective, they are one and the same. The only thing WADA want to know is were the players given a prohibited substance. Who gave it to them under what pretenses is nothing they care about, for them there is no line between a player knowingly taking steroids or being duped by their coach into taking steroids, the end result is the same in both cases: The player got an unfair advantage due to the use of steroids. And they respond the same way in both cases: bring out the banhammer. There is some provision for leniency if the players can prove they took reasonable steps to ensure they are in compliance. But to WADA, leniency is an 18month ban instead of a 24month ban :P

[silloc]

Essendon players were given lists of what they were "supposed" to be getting, that wasn't the problem. Stuart Crameri's mother stated she went through the whole list with a fine tooth comb and made sure they were all legal. Its the fact essendon have no records established enough to prove what it was.

So all the other clubs that weren't caught out, the players would have been none the wiser.

Unless Crameri's mother directly contacted ASADA to enquire about everything on the list (which they encourage you to do if you aren't sure about something) then I don't think we can say she knew for sure they were legal... Google doesn't really cut it I'm afraid. Which does assume that she isn't herself a biochemist/physiologist which she may well be, but I still think she wouldn't know enough about anti-doping to really know.

"Mrs Crameri said her son had brought home the consent form he signed in 2012 and they had researched the substances online and checked their status on the WADA website."

Seriously I don't know what more they can expect a player to do

[silloc]

Oh, and yes I know that WADA don't give a flower about the semantics of who the dodgy one is. I was referring more to a public perception of the essendon football club.

It's like nails on a chalk board every time I hear some nobody talk about it. "I think james hird was on drugs when he was playing too". "they were on steroids." "did you here they shredded all there paperwork"

It's different on this forum as 90% of people here have done the research and read the articles, but as far as the general populace goes... Essendon may as well have been doing lines of coke at half time and juicing during the preseason.

[roo boys!]

Essendon may as well have been doing lines of coke at half time

Worked for the Eagles in '06 :P