Penrith punish rusty Roosters
10 hours ago | Aidan Edgecomb
It?s a call I have heard so many times in the past few years, but one I have never agreed with: kick the Bulldogs out of the competition. Now, I?m one of the legion of people who believe the Bulldogs should not be playing in the toughest competition in the world.
Tough is a word the Bulldogs and their management simply don?t know.
Where to start?
Perhaps we should start with the fact the Bulldogs have a weak drug policy ? not a tough one as they like to proclaim. A tough drug policy would be one that gets a role model to children who is taking illegal drugs kicked out of the club. A tough drug policy would name and shame a player who tests positive to drugs ? whether performance enhancing or not. The Bulldogs current drug policy allows any player who tests positive to recreational drug to hide behind a fine and continue playing.
Currently, the Bulldogs are hiding behind a weak privacy agreement they have with players. A privacy agreement that allows players who are BREAKING THE LAW to simply keep playing and go unpunished by police and the courts. Who are the Bulldogs to take the law into their own hands by deciding a $25,000 fine was sufficient? If a player tested positive to drugs, and of course the Bulldogs still won?t confirm this thanks to the previously mentioned privacy agreement, they should have been dropped from the club, taken to the Police and dealt with.
Drugs do not belong in our game.
Imagine the loopholes such a system and privacy agreement provides. The Bulldogs could do an internal test on a player, discover he has been taking a performance enhancing drug, and quickly drop him from first grade, fine him and proclaim to the media and the NRL that he is injured. This would prevent the NRL from picking the drug up in their random testing, as most players are only tested at the competition of matches (not every game, of course).
This would allow the Bulldogs to skip a possible two-year suspension of that player.
For one moment I am not suggesting the Bulldogs would do this, but let?s remember ? this is the club that continued to rort the salary cap by excessive amounts. As I said, they may not do this and one would hope it isn?t even a consideration ? but the loophole is there. Hence, the Bulldogs drug testing procedures are absolutely weak and not strong as they like to suggest.
Now, onto the sexual assault allegations that have fortunately taken a back seat for the time being (but they?ll be back once the police complete their investigations).
Firstly, how absolutely ridiculous for the management of the club to allow players to go back to the same resort where a sexual assault was alleged to have happened the year before. Even if it didn?t happen, one would think the club?s management would get their brains into gear and not go back to the same location.
Once the sexual assault allegations surfaced, it only got worse. The clothes players wore to interviews with Police was disgraceful, the way in which the club handles the whole situation just ridiculous. And to sack Garry Hughes over the situation was a poor decision indeed. If the club is not willing to take action against players until Police investigations have completed, then why sack Hughes so early in the piece? Making him a scapegoat simply didn?t work.
The players are grown men ? they should know that when being interviewed by Police, you should at least wear a pair of pants. It?s not that hard. If Hughes was sacked for ?failing to ensure the club?s code of conduct was upheld at all times?, then surely that means players breached the code of conduct. Why haven?t they been sacked? Sacking players for breaching the code of conduct doesn?t imply that the players are guilty of a sexual assault.
The latest drama with the club?s fans are the last straw. Innocent people, children and families should not have to tolerate what happened on Friday night. Unfortunately, Friday wasn?t a stand-out incident. This has happened and continues to happen at Bulldogs matches and its time the NRL got tough. If the club?s fans can?t control themselves, and officials can?t keep them out of the ground, then the club should either be playing in front of empty houses or not be playing at all.
The Bulldogs name, once a great piece of rugby league, has been disgraced.
It was disgraced when club management tried to cheat their way to a competition by rorting the salary cap, it was disgraced by the way players snubbed their noses at authority, it has been disgraced by the cheap and weak drug policy, it has been disgraced over the Willie Mason affair and it is continually disgraced by their own fans.
Yes, of course I realise that the majority of fans are good, and that the players mean well ... but unfortunately, the bad apples have ruined it for everybody.
Kick them out. There?s teams with better vision, better structure and fans who can control themselves lining up to be in the competition.