Greater Western Sydney general manager of football operations Wayne Campbell says that Brett Deledio has made a fair sacrifice in moving to the Giants.
The former Richmond captain says that Deledio, who moved to GWS on a three-year deal with Richmond receiving a future first and third-round pick in return, had been touted as a potential trade target for a while but the opportunity to properly speak with the veteran didn’t present itself until last weekend.
“He’s probably been a name on the board for a fair while, but when it became evident that he wanted to go to Geelong, we dropped off it, not that we had really spoken to him before that,” said Campbell on SEN Breakfast.
“Then over the weekend the Geelong thing wasn’t going to happen, so we spoke to him and his manager on Sunday and it moved pretty quickly from there.”
Campbell says that the history at Punt Road he, (GWS list manager) Craig Cameron and coach Leon Cameron made negotiations with Deledio slightly easier, but he still required convincing to move clubs.
“He was comfortable with me, Craig Cameron and he also knew Leon Cameron quite well. I think it gets you in the door but yeah, we then had to convince him that we were the right footy club to come to, for (wife) Katie and his whole family really,” he said.
Campbell says that the club had to part ways with a host of younger players to be able to fit the Giants' established players into its salary cap, which was only recently changed to eliminate concessions made to the club in its formative years.
He says this has forced Deledio to take a pay cut to play with the Giants, calling it a fair sacrifice.
“I think people need to be aware that is why so many players have gone out. The AFL rules and the list rules said we had an extra $530,000 in our list for 2017 and a list of 42,” said Campbell.
“That changed in the last six months so that is why we have had to have so many players go out, because of the money and because of the list rule changes that send things back to an even footing along with the other 17 clubs in the competition.
“He’s taken a fair sacrifice to come. He wants to come to place where he thinks he can win some games in the back end of his career and he thinks he can add to that.”
Campbell also revealed that Pick 13 in this year’s AFL National Draft was on the table in the discussions with Richmond, but the Tigers were forced to accept Geelong’s 2017 first-round pick when the Bryce Gibbs deal broke down.
“We were waiting for the Adelaide-Carlton deal to either happen or not happen,” he said.
“13 was going to go to Richmond and that’s why it waited till 1:35 till Adelaide and Carlton decided their deal wasn’t going ahead, so that is why we went with the Geelong future first pick.”
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