Adelaide Crows chief executive Steven Trigg . Picture: Sarah Reed. Source: adelaidenow
THE Adelaide Football Club has vowed to assemble the best legal team in town to help it fight AFL charges of draft tampering and salary cap breaches.
Crows heavyweights, chairman Rob Chapman, chief executive Steven Trigg and former football operations manager John Reid spent yesterday locked in talks with high-powered legal firms and advisers to prepare to face the AFL Commission at league headquarters in Melbourne on Monday.
Stung by the charges laid against it in the Kurt Tippett fiasco and facing a six-figure fine and significant draft bans, Adelaide is working on an impassioned bid to minimise its punishment.
"We will be prepared. We will leave no stone unturned to push our case," Chapman told The Advertiser, revealing the Crows do not employ a regular law firm.
"We have been speaking to our advisers, we will find the best people to represent us and we will put the best case forward we possibly can next week."
The Crows, Trigg, Reid and Tippett will appear before the commission on two charges in the biggest off-field controversy in the club's 22-year history.
They are conduct prejudicial to the draft and a breach of the AFL rules on total player payments relating to a secret agreement made with Tippett and his management team when the key forward penned his last contract with the club three years ago.
The agreement is understood to have included a clause enabling Tippett to walk to the club of his choice for a second-round draft pick when his contract expired at the end of the 2012 season.
He also is alleged to have been paid $200,000 in third-party agreements. Tippett - who values himself at $1 million a season and now faces suspension or deregistration - sought a trade to premier Sydney in last month's exchange period but this was denied by the AFL.
The Crows are keen to tell their story, believing it differs greatly from that of the Tippett camp. With Adelaide under AFL investigation and still to finalise its case, Chapman was guarded with what he could say.
But it is understood the club believes its wrongdoings are "at the lower end of the scale" and were undertaken at a time when the rules governing third-party agreements were less defined.
"All I can say at this point is that Steven, me, JR (Reid) and the club will be considering all advice, including legal advice," Chapman said.
"We will be looking at the charges and what they pertain to and making a case accordingly.
"Steven and I have spent countless hours on this in preparation for this day (Monday), which we knew was coming.
"We will all be prepared."
While the AFL has summoned the Crows to AFL House at 12.30pm on Monday, the club has been told that the hearing could spill into the following day.
The AFL hopes to hand down its penalties before the November 22 national draft.
The SANFL has thrown its support behind Adelaide, with chief Leigh Whicker saying "everyone mucks up in their lifetime" and that the club would "take its medicine and saddle up for 2013".
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Crows turn to legal eagles
Dengan url
http://astagaberita.blogspot.com/2012/11/crows-turn-to-legal-eagles.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Crows turn to legal eagles
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar