Essendon was troubled on-field by the club’s instability at board level last year, assistant coach Blake Caracella admits.
However, he says the Bombers have quickly moved on and are fully focused on 2023.
Former president Paul Brasher – a noted supporter of Ben Rutten – was rolled by David Barham at the end of the 2022 season after weeks of rumblings of discontent within the board.
In the off-season, Essendon also appointed Andrew Thorburn as CEO before he departed the club 24 hours later, while Barham also reportedly struggled to hold onto his presidency.
Speaking to AFL Nation pre-game, Caracella was questioned around whether his team was impacted by instability at the top last year.
“You’d hope not but no doubt it does,” he responded.
“I’ve been fairly lucky as a player and a coach not to have too much instability, but there’s no doubt it does trickle down through the hierarchy to the playing group.
“I reckon that happened towards the second half of last year too and it does cause some trouble.
“But I think players do move on really quickly, the new coach comes in and we’ve been focused on this season, Round 1 since the start of pre-season, which was three months ago.
“We are playing a bit differently and looking forward to a challenge against the Hawks.”
Essendon lost four of its last five games in 2022, including in Rounds 22 and 23 by a combined margin of 150 points.
Tensions between football boss Josh Mahoney and list manager Adrian Dodoro have also led new CEO Craig Vozzo to stamp his authority and modify the reporting lines within the football department in recent days.
Reporters have suggested over the last year that Mahoney and Dodoro have a lack of support for each other, but after Vozzo’s move on the eve of the season, club great Matthew Lloyd questioned if the situation had become untenable.
“It’s hard enough to win as it is, to beat the opposition,” he told Nine’s Sunday Footy Show.
"There is significant doubt about whether he actually plays again this year."
— Footy on Nine (@FootyonNine) March 19, 2023
Damian Barrett gives us an update on Peter Wright, as the panel dissects the Bombers' 'untenable' football department conflict. #9AFLSFS | @Channel9 pic.twitter.com/laJH5NHcAJ
“But if you’ve got two guys in such key roles not talking to each other, you’d think it's untenable.
“I just wonder if they’ve got the two of them in a room at some stage and said, ‘Sort it out and if you can’t sort it out we’re going to have to make a decision on one of you or both of you ourselves’.
“I think that’s how important it is to get those key decisions right with key people in the club.”