Sheedy, Roberts vying with anti-pokies challenger for two spots on Essendon board
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Essendon will have three candidates, including club legend Kevin Sheedy and a challenger, contesting two positions in the club’s upcoming board election.
Sheedy and fellow incumbent board member Tim Roberts are standing for the two board spots, along with challenger Graham Evans, who is standing on an anti-poker machine platform. Voting begins on Friday.
Kevin Sheedy is seeking re-election on the Essendon board.Credit: Eddie Jim
Essendon president David Barham confirmed that he had asked Sheedy, who turns 76 on Christmas Eve, to stand for re-election to the board.
“I encouraged ‘Sheeds’ to stand again because he’s making a great contribution,” said Barham. “What we need now is stability and unity as we move forward.”
The Essendon hierarchy is keen for the little-known Roberts, a construction executive whom they say is crucial to the club’s plans, to be retained on the board.
But Barham and the board are unwilling to campaign openly and forcefully push for members to vote for Roberts or Sheedy, believing that campaigning for and against candidates would be inappropriate.
Sheedy, in any case, is assured of election given his status with the membership as the club’s only living (four-time) premiership coach and arguably most influential figure since World War II.
Roberts, according to Essendon chief executive Craig Vozzo, has been important to the Bombers in searching for “alternate revenue” streams, in redeveloping Windy Hill and helping Vozzo and new executive and former player Mark Bolton, Essendon’s head of strategy, in their early months in their new roles. “Tim’s invaluable from a club perspective because of his skill base and experience in this sort of area [alternative revenues and major projects],” said Vozzo.
Roberts was appointed to the club board in November 2022 following a re-configuring of the board over the issue of Ben Rutten’s removal as senior coach.
Roberts is executive director of WT(Australia) and worked on projects such as Caulfield, Moonee Valley and Sandown racecourses, the VRC club stand (Flemington), Marvel Stadium, Eden Park (New Zealand), Carlton’s Princes Park and Essendon’s own Hangar facility.
Evans is the only challenger to the existing board, running on a platform of opposition to Essendon’s gaming interests. Evans and two other members of a group met with Vozzo during 2023 to voice their opposition to the club’s gaming operations.
The Bombers’ counter, to date, has been that they need to source alternative revenue streams or investments before they can afford to jettison pokies, as other clubs, such as Geelong and Collingwood, have.
Sheedy wants to continue as a board member, having been brought on to the board by previous president Paul Brasher at the end of 2020, when the Bombers were dealing with the exodus of key players Joe Daniher, Adam Saad and Conor McKenna and facing member unrest. Sheedy caused angst late in 2022 when he broke ranks with the board to say that he had wanted former champion James Hird to be appointed senior coach rather than Brad Scott, but has since backed Scott as the right man to revive Essendon.
All of Essendon’s 2023 members are eligible to vote in the election, with voting closing on Friday December 15.
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