Adelaide Crows’ chairman and chief executive have apologized to former players Eddie Betts and Josh Jenkins over their experience at the controversial 2018 pre-season training camp.
Key points:
Eddie Betts and Josh Jenkins spoke publicly about what went wrong at the Crows pre-season camp
Crows chairman and chief executive apologize to both players and club members
A SafeWork SA investigation had cleared the field of work safety breaches
Adelaide Football Club chairman John Olsen and chief executive Tim Silvers have penned an open letter to club members and fans after Betts’ released a book last week revealing how confidential information was used to verbally abuse him during the camp.
Former Crows Josh Jenkins and Bryce Gibbs also expressed their disappointment at the camp and how players were sworn to secrecy about what had occurred.
“We apologize to Eddie, Josh and any other player, coach or staff member, who had a negative experience during this time,” Olsen and Silvers wrote.
“It has been confronting to hear Eddie Betts and Josh Jenkins describe their experiences during the 2018 pre-season training camp on the Gold Coast, as well as the subsequent hurt they have carried.
“Equally we are sorry to hear Bryce Gibbs express his disappointment at the way in which the camp and events surrounding it were handled and its impact on the playing group, and we acknowledge there are others who may feel the same way.
“The most important thing we can do now is listen and offer our support.”
Adelaide Crows chief executive Tim Silvers apologized to Eddie Betts last week.(ABC News: Camron Slessor)
Olsen and Silvers said “moving on” as a club would be “difficult”.
“Everyone will do it in their own time and in their own way, and we sincerely hope that, with the passage of time, the healing process can take place,” they wrote.
“We are committed to emerging from this painful and challenging period and getting better.
“While we cannot rewrite history, we remain determined to learn from the past.”
The pair stressed that the club culture had shifted in the past few years, with changes to several leadership positions.
Coach Don Pyke (left) and Crows chairman Rob Chapman (right) have since left the club.(abcnews)
Then-coach Don Pyke, head of football Brett Burton, chairman Rob Chapman and chief executive Andrew Fagan have since left their roles.
The camp was held after Adelaide’s defeat to Richmond in the 2017 Grand Final.
Silvers and AFL boss Gillon McLachlan have apologized to Betts for the hurt caused by the camp amid a potential class action.
Betts’ biography further detailed misappropriate use of Aboriginal rituals while Jenkins claimed details about his upbringing were used against him during the camp, despite him explicitly requested it not be shared.
The AFL and SafeWork SA completed separated investigations and found no breaches to work safety laws.
However, the AFL Players’ Association is contacting all players from the 2018 camp to gain better understanding of the issues that were raised.
Former Adelaide Crows footballer Bryce Gibbs has admitted a controversial pre-season training camp fractured the playing group and says he regrets not speaking up about it.
Key points:
Bryce Gibbs joined the Adelaide Crows in 2017 shortly before the preseason training camp
He says he regrets not speaking up and supporting his teammates
Eddie Betts and Josh Jenkins this week shared their experience of the camp
Gibbs is the latest player to speak publicly about the camp, echoing concerns about the Gold Coast trip raised by former teammates Eddie Betts and Josh Jenkins.
Betts wrote in his book, released this week, how personal details he confidentially shared with a counselor were used to verbally abuse him in front of teammates, in an experience he found “traumatizing.”
In another example, Betts details how First Nations rituals were misappropriated, which he found “extremely disrespectful”.
Gibbs said incidents shared by Betts and Jenkins about the camp should not have happened.
“When I reflect, this is where I feel really disappointed in myself, this is when I started to take a back seat, watching guys stand up and say ‘this is not on, we need to address this, we need to tell people what happened’, they seemed to get shut down pretty quickly,” Gibbs told radio station SEN SA.
Gibbs was traded from Carlton at the end of 2017 and joined Adelaide weeks before the players went on the camp, where he was included in the more intensive “group one” version of the camp alongside nine other players and two coaches.
The retired AFL player said he was disappointed he did not support teammates who experienced a more difficult time during the camp than he did.
Eddie Betts’ biography, The Boy from Boomerang Crescent, includes claims about his traumatic experience during the training camp.(ABC News: Ben Pettit)
“Reflecting on those ongoing conversations when we were trying to flush it out, I do regret not speaking up when I probably should’ve been a more experienced and senior player of that group,” he said.
“It did fracture the playing group, it fractured relationships in the football department, players lost trust with members in that football department.”
In a statement made in 2021, the Crows said a SafeWork SA investigation “found neither the club nor any other person or organisation, breached any work-health-and-safety laws during or in relation to the camp.”
“We tried to move on where that was obviously the wrong thing to do and that’s probably why we’re speaking about it four years on,” Gibbs said.
“If it was handled correctly and people had taken responsibility, put their hand up and knocked it on the head a lot earlier when it happened, it still would’ve been hard as people still went through what they went through – and people will still carry some emotional scars from it — but at least it would’ve been dealt with in the proper manner then and there.”
‘It shouldn’t have happened’
Gibbs said he took a call from a counselor before the camp to discuss his childhood and past experiences, which he thought was “a bit of a red flag.” He said he was “pretty calculated” in what he disclosed.
He said by not divulging too much to the counsellor, his experience of the camp was different from what Betts and Jenkins spoke about this week.
“Reflecting on it all, it just shouldn’t have happened. It was easier for me to move on as I didn’t have that level of experience and trauma put to me, I found it easier to suppress it and squash it and just try and move on personally which I was able to do, which made it easier for me,” Gibbs said.
“That’s my experience of the camp, obviously very different to a lot of people.”
Eddie Betts and Josh Jenkins (right) have both spoken publicly about the 2018 pre-season training camp.(AAP: Tracey Nearmy)
Jenkins recalled an exercise involving players being hoisted up in harnesses while having abuse hurled at them by facilitators and teammates, including “some of the barbs” being thrown at Betts.
Gibbs said he was told not to reveal details of the camp to players in the other groups of the camp.
“Getting spoken to and getting educated on what to say to family, friends and the other guys in the other groups, we were told not to go into detail about what happened and for whatever reason most of us stuck to that at the time,” he said.
‘Strange rules’ during camp
Gibbs said he experienced “unusual things” and “plenty of red flags” during the infamous training trip but convinced himself to keep an open mind and that the camp would help build stronger relationships with his teammates.
The 268-game veteran shared that on the trip to the campsite, Crows players were blindfolded and were not allowed to talk on the bus, which had blacked-out windows.
They played heavy metal music on the bus and talked about the 2017 Grand Final, in which Adelaide were heavily defeated by Richmond, and Gibbs’ departure from Carlton.
Gibbs said “strange rules” were enforced during the camp, including players being required to walk in a straight line and not being allowed to use their mobile phones or shower.
Bryce Gibbs plays for South Adelaide in SANFL since retiring from AFL in 2020.(Supplied: Nick Hook via South Adelaide FC)
He said some of the rules imposed were “hard to justify” and players were doubting the benefits of the training.
“I felt like we were in a bit of a state of mind, this whole experience was happening around us and a couple of guys spoke up about their concerns, it was sort of negotiated that we would continue on with what we were doing,” Gibbs said.
“I think Eddie used “brainwashed”, as he described it, but in the state of mind and in the moment we just continued doing what they’d set out to do.
“It probably wasn’t until later on when reflecting on it that it was probably an opportunity to speak up a bit more.”
The AFL and the Adelaide Football Club have both apologized to Betts for the trauma caused by the camp.
Prominent Adelaide lawyer Greg Griffin said he had spoken to at least seven players who were on the 2018 Crows’ list about a potential class action.
