Around 8pm on Sunday, Sydney had just locked in second spot on the AFL ladder. Their win over Essendon ensured they would play two home finals and only a dead rubber remained to complete the Swans’ home-and-away season.
As he fronted the post-match press conference, all coach Dean Cox would have expected in the immediate aftermath was a standard night for a footy club on an away trip: maybe a couple of beers, bed and a boring bus trip to the airport to fly home.
He even spoke to the club’s ability to handle surprises.
“One thing this football club has done really well over a long period of time [is] be ready for the unexpected,” he said, when asked about the possibility of assistant Mark McVeigh being appointed Essendon coach ahead of the Swans’ finals campaign.
Little could anyone have imagined that less than 12 hours later, police would be swarming the hotel where the Swans had spent Sunday night and five players – including Isaac Heeney, Chad Warner, Riley Bice and James Jordon – would be caught up in an investigation into an alleged sexual assault. This masthead is not suggesting all five players are under investigation by police, just that they have spoken to police to assist their enquiries.
Club officials were left to deal with something so unexpected that no one at Sydney or across the competition can be sure how it will play out.
A police statement was released later on Monday morning that contained enough information for Sydney CEO Matthew Pavlich to say without reservation that the club was “shocked and disappointed” at the situation several Swans’ players are in.
Pavlich reeled off his rehearsed lines for less than a minute, ending the media conference after just one question. It allowed him to keep his emotions hidden as he employed the experience he gained as a newsreader in Perth post his playing career to keep the message concise.
Some would have called for empathy to the complainants, but he was a man on a mission performing a set play, clearly wanting to get in and out of the fraught situation as quickly as he could.
Victoria Police said it was “investigating a report of a sexual assault in East Melbourne on August 17” and that the “exact circumstances are yet to be established”.
None of that is good. But those final seven words are important as a qualifier when trying to make sense of what this might mean for the competition, the club and the players involved.
As with all such situations, the best decisions arise after facts are established.
What is certain is that players who had been casually kicking footballs while dressed in tracksuits around Yarra Park on Sunday morning were now in turmoil. Those inside the camp, but not involved in the incident, were genuinely shattered at the turn of events.
Their thoughts were for the alleged victims making the reports – as they should be.
Finding out exactly what happened is the domain of the police. The AFL integrity unit will step into the background to allow them to do their work without interruption.
But that doesn’t mean the matter goes quiet.
When the players’ names eventually become public then the club and the AFL will face a difficult decision. Should those at the centre of the alleged incident play in finals while an investigation is occurring?
It would be unprecedented for the AFL to ban an individual from playing if no charges have been laid. It would also be grossly unfair given the presumption of innocence is a bedrock principle of our justice system.
But without a policy to determine how such matters are handled it will also be difficult for the league to manage the fallout of letting a player or players subject to a serious allegation appear at the pointy end of finals, where they may win Norm Smith Medals and appear on a premiership dais.
Unlike the NRL, which in 2019 introduced a no-fault stand down policy for players charged with criminal offences that could attract a jail term of 11 years or more, the AFL has preferred to deal with issues on a case-by-case basis. But it has not been afraid to put the image of the game above the rights of the individual.
The case of Geelong’s Tanner Bruhn is a recent example. He missed last season at VFL and AFL level as he faced sexual assault charges that were later withdrawn after a key witness was found to have lied.
That proved to be unfair on Bruhn even if the logic behind his suspension was not.
Now the AFL has a situation where a no-fault stand-down policy would be useful because such questions are not ones to be considered on the run.
A policy would make it clear what the immediate path forward was for the game, the club and individuals now subject to a police investigation.
Sydney also have a big decision to make on what ramifications there are for players who find themselves in such a situation on the morning after a round 23 match on the eve of finals.
“What the hell” is the most pleasant of questions the hierarchy should be asking.
Regardless of the outcome, the no-fault stand-down policy is a question that needs to be addressed soon.
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