Collingwood president Eddie McGuire admits Adam Treloar’s exit “wasn’t as smooth” as the club had hoped.
Treloar was traded to the Western Bulldogs for a raft of draft picks despite having five years to run on a lucrative Magpies contract.
“I would love to not have had the dramas in the end,” McGuire told SEN SA Breakfast.
“I still speak to Adam, he’s gone to a great club, so the ultimate thing for us in the end was that he got to the club that he wanted to go to – albeit that he wanted to stay at Collingwood but we had to move him on.
“The strategy was there but the execution wasn’t as smooth as we would have liked.”
Collingwood and the Bulldogs meet in a Round 1 blockbuster with Treloar to face his former club for the first time since his messy departure.
McGuire also added that the Magpies are in no rush to open contract talks with long-serving coach Nathan Buckley with his deal set to expire at the end of this year.
“He knows our situation at Collingwood. We love Nathan Buckley,” he said.
“We’ve got plenty of time, there’s no rush. The COVID situation gives it another layer of intrigue as we go and also you have to be a little bit smarter in how you analyse how teams have gone.
“I thought we did pretty well last year. We had a few setbacks along the way, at the start of the year I thought we were just about primed to win it and then had a few injuries, we had a pretty tough run with the fixturing – not that that is an excuse – I’m just saying we did and other clubs did too.
“We’re pretty confident we’ll have a good year this year and to answer your direct question, it’s not even on the table.”