Dear Members,
There is no shying away from the fact that the 2024 AFL season has been a disappointing one for our football club. Our expectation was that we had the program and talent to be contending at the pointy end of the AFL season and we fell well short of this. In addition, we have again faced our challenges off the field and these events take their toll on our people, including our members.
While it hurts to be watching the on-field action at this time of year, we must quickly switch our mindset towards moving forward, both on and off the field, to ensure our AFL team climbs back up the ladder in 2025.
With this in mind, the club is conducting two separate reviews: one of its Board and one of its men’s football program.
The Board review follows the recent transition from Kate Roffey to Brad Green in the role of President. As is common practice, the review is being led by an external independent expert, involves the President and all current Directors, and will benchmark the Board against best practice.
The review of the men’s football department is focusing on the operations and overarching environment of the AFL program. This review is being conducted by President Brad Green, CEO Gary Pert and external consultant Darren Shand.
For more than two decades, Darren served as the All Blacks Manager and was a crucial driver in creating and maintaining the environment which shaped the New Zealand All Blacks into the world’s most successful international sports team. Throughout his time as All Blacks Manager, the team won back-to-back World Cup tournaments in 2011 and 2015, and also won the Tri Nations and subsequent Rugby Championship six times.
Darren is already familiar with our program, having spent time in the club earlier this year observing all elements of the men’s football program.
While it will identify areas in which we need to get better, we believe it will also highlight many positive elements of our AFL program, and why we should head into next season with well-founded optimism about what we can achieve.
The ambition of both review processes is to strive for excellence and to ensure, that as our game demands, we evolve to achieve sustained success.
This ambition can only be achieved with alignment and commitment to our values of trust, respect, unity and excellence.
The reviews of both the AFL program and the Board will be completed in October and the priorities identified will be communicated to our members.
Your Board, CEO Gary Pert and the club’s leaders are committed to doing all we can to make the members of this great club proud to belong and we are confident these reviews will bring key insights to assist us in delivering on this commitment.
The Melbourne Football Club Board
