Tag: Board Decisions

Making Hard Decisions — Anti-Rugby-League?

Part 42 of 70 — Original Chapter: Chapter 12: The Anti-Football Myth

This article forms part of the serialised republication of Panthers, Passion & Politics – The Roger Cowan Years.

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Early in 2001 the Board approved Mark Levy’s recommendation that Royce Simmons be re-signed for a further two years. The decision ultimately led to his departure in a way that, to Cowan, was both regrettable and unnecessary.

Royce Simmons was an icon in Penrith. He had come from the country as a young player and had shown enormous commitment to the club for close to twenty years. He was – justifiably – looked upon as one of the heroes of the Panthers’ 1991 Grand Final win. He was extremely popular with sponsors and supporters.

Levy approached the board in early 2001, saying that Simmons believed that some high-profile players would not sign new contracts until they knew Simmons’ contract had been extended. Cowan remembers there was mixed reaction from the Board. Significantly, the five directors who so often voted together were themselves divided on the issue.

Cowan believed the mechanisms that had previously allowed for detailed discussion and analysis were no longer operating in the same way, making the situation even more difficult.  Most importantly, it had to be handled carefully. Because of Simmons’ popularity, if word leaked that the board was reluctant to extend his contract, a strong backlash was likely.

He had been quite successful as a coach, which increased the pressure. Although the club had been badly damaged by the Super League wars, Simmons had taken the team to the finals in 1997 and again in 2000. In 2000, the club had also broken records for attendance and sponsorship.

Taking all this into account, the Board agreed with Levy’s proposal and signed the two year contract. Cowan says the 2001 season was a disaster.

The team was not just losing; it was barely competitive in many games. It finished the season in last place. In Royce’s defence, he had been at the club for a very long time compared with the usual coaching careers. A rigid salary cap had prevented the club from adding any new players to the team. However, we still had a good solid base from the previous year, and we had faced the new season with high hopes.

But it does not work that way in rugby league.  Having no new blood served to dampen the morale and enthusiasm of the coach, the staff, and the team. The continual losses hit Royce particularly hard. They sapped his confidence, which didn’t help the situation. By the middle of the season, it was obvious that we were in trouble.

In my own mind I was trying to work out how we could overcome the problem at the end of the year. Royce had a two-year contract, and the decision-making processes of the club were basically in the hands of five directors.

By the second half of the season, Cowan had reached the view that the only way to restore spirit to the team was to replace the coach and several members of the football staff.

He could see no value in making drastic changes halfway through the season. It was his plan to spend the remainder of the season collecting as much information as possible, and to work with some trusted staff to try to analyse the problems and come up with solutions.

Had things been different, part of the process would have been consultations with the Board, but he says that by this time, breaches of confidentiality were a fact of life at that level. The last thing the coach and team needed was to have their problems publicly debated in newspapers, and on television and radio. Cowan adds that it often seemed that Ron Mulock and the Western Weekender knew things before he did.

Around the same time, and unbeknown to the rest of the Board, Dennis Coffey and John Bateman were meeting privately with some senior Panthers players. They later said that players had expressed dissatisfaction with the coach during those meetings.

To Cowan, the meetings presented a serious governance problem. He believed concerns of that significance should have been brought back to the full Board and management rather than pursued independently by individual directors. This was particularly difficult for him to reconcile with Bateman’s frequently expressed concerns about corporate governance.

It was also extremely naïve to think that the meetings would remain secret.1

Soon there was a blaze of publicity. Instead of being handled with discretion and objectivity, Simmons’ future became an emotional public issue that further undermined his position.There were divisions among sponsors and fans. The players, already suffering because of the bad season, were caught in the crossfire.

Cowan says he backed away from making a recommendation but suggested that they consider moving back to the old system, where the responsibility for hiring and firing rested with management. 

Greg Evans was vehemently opposed to handing back this power.  I was equally obstinate, believing that it was the only way to fix the problem without causing more conflict in the community.

Finally, the Board agreed that Cowan should handle the matter, effectively returning responsibility for the coaching decision to management. Royce Simmons was sacked as coach, to be followed soon after by most of the coaching staff.

As a result, Greg Evans resigned from the Board, to be reinstated about six months later.

Substantial changes followed within the rugby league operation. John Lang was appointed coach, and two seasons later Penrith won its second premiership.

Cowan reflects on the problem:

The phenomenon of coaches reaching a year of failure is not unusual.  It is not because a good coach suddenly becomes a bad coach.  Had Royce Simmons left Panthers one year earlier, he would have left on a very high note. He gave much to the club over many years. As a coach he was virtually a workaholic and would probably have cheerfully donated his right arm in return for a successful Panthers team. The way he left was sad and did not do justice to his service with the club. What is even more sad is that it could have been avoided.

Recognition should also be accorded to many others from that era, including Mark Levy and all of Royce’s coaching and support staff. Unfortunately, timing in these matters is all-important – a club full of heroes at the end of 2000 and most of them sacked by the end of 2001.

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  1. Max Cowan recalls speaking to some players about what was happening. “Some were furious that other players were, as they saw it, putting the skids under Royce; others were despondent at the prospect of continuing with him as coach. It seemed clear to me that Bateman and Coffey had unwittingly undermined the coach and added to the instability of the team. ↩︎

← Part 41 · All Parts · Part 43 →

Commentary and Contributions

Major Player: John Bateman

John Bateman OAM
Photo: Western Weekender 2018

John Gerard Bateman OAM

Solicitor; Penrith City Councillor and Mayor; Panthers Director; Member of the “Footy Five”

John Bateman was a highly prominent public figure in Penrith during the 1990s and early 2000s. A respected solicitor, local government leader and long-serving councillor, he combined legal expertise with extensive community and political experience. His appointment to the Panthers Board reflected both his professional standing and the growing stature of Panthers as one of Western Sydney’s largest and most influential organisations.

Within Panthers, Passion & Politics, Bateman emerges as one of the principal figures in the governance conflicts that reshaped the organisation during the closing years of Roger Cowan’s administration. Initially appointed to strengthen the Board, he later became one of the leading advocates of an alternative direction for Panthers during the Super League era, the merger debates and the internal disputes that followed.

Role in the Narrative

John Bateman’s involvement in the narrative spans much of the conflict that dominates the latter half of Panthers, Passion & Politics.

Appointed to the Panthers Board in the mid-1990s, he entered the organisation at a time when Panthers had grown from a successful licensed club into one of the largest community organisations in New South Wales. Board membership had become both influential and prestigious, attracting individuals whose professional experience and public standing could contribute to the increasingly complex governance of the organisation

Bateman quickly became an influential director. During the Super League conflict and the subsequent National Rugby League rationalisation process, he emerged as one of the strongest advocates for Panthers pursuing a stand-alone future rather than preparing contingency plans involving merger discussions. He became closely associated with the group of directors later known as the “Footy Five.”

As disagreements between management and sections of the Board intensified, Bateman became one of the central figures in debates surrounding merger negotiations, governance, Board authority and the future direction of Panthers — in particular the governance arrangements associated with Panthers’ club amalgamations. He was a prominent witness in the Temby Inquiry and he categorically denies playing any part in its calling. Bateman in one of the most significant individuals in the later chapters of this story.

Background

Profession: Solicitor

John Bateman established a legal practice in Penrith that became one of the region’s best-known firms. Admitted as a solicitor of the Supreme Court of New South Wales, he built a reputation in both legal practice and community leadership, later becoming a founding partner of Bateman Battersby Lawyers.

Community Leadership:

Bateman’s public life extended well beyond the legal profession. He served for many years as a Penrith City Councillor, Deputy Mayor (1997–98) and Mayor of Penrith (1998–2000), leading the city during preparations for and staging of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, when Penrith hosted rowing and canoe/kayak events.

His community involvement also included service with the Nepean Medical Research Foundation, the Penrith Valley Economic Development Corporation, the Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre, the Penrith Olympic Torch Relay Committee and numerous sporting and community organisations. He also served on the boards of Panthers, Penrith Rugby Club and the Western Sydney Academy of Sport, reflecting his long-standing commitment to the Penrith region.

Honours:
• Australian Sports Medal (2000)
• Centenary Medal (2001)
• Penrith Citizen of the Year (2008)
• Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) (2018)
• Western Sydney University Community Fellow (2019)
• Honoured Citizen of the City of Penrith (2022)

Appointment to the Panthers Board of Directors:

By the mid-1990s Panthers had become the largest licensed club in New South Wales, one of the largest employers in Western Sydney and one of the region’s most influential organisations. An appointment to the Panthers Board had become one of the most prestigious voluntary positions in the Penrith region, reflecting the organisation’s extraordinary growth and influence.

Bateman was appointed to fill a casual vacancy on the Panthers Board rather than being elected by members. Board appointments increasingly reflected the need for professional expertise alongside traditional community representation. His appointment reflected the confidence directors placed in his legal expertise, political experience and public profile. He also had longstanding interests in sport and established relationships with several existing directors.

Bateman therefore arrived at Panthers not as an unknown community volunteer, but as one of the region’s best-known civic and professional leaders. The Board regarded his appointment as strengthening its capacity to deal with the increasingly complex strategic challenges confronting Panthers.

John Bateman was appointed because he was exactly the sort of director Panthers needed — and the appointment was exactly the sort of position Bateman desired.

Relevance to Events Described

John Bateman’s importance to Panthers, Passion & Politics lies not simply in the positions he held, but in the influence he exercised during one of the most turbulent periods in the club’s history.

During the Super League conflict he became a leading advocate for the view that Panthers should focus on remaining an independent club rather than pursue merger negotiations with another organisation. Although management regarded merger discussions as prudent contingency planning in response to an uncertain future, Bateman believed that even a non-binding declaration of intent could ultimately place Panthers on a path towards losing its independence.

His position reflected a fundamentally different assessment of the risks facing the club.

As the governance conflict deepened, Bateman became one of the most influential members of the group that became known as the “Footy Five.” Together they challenged aspects of the existing governance structure and increasingly opposed Roger Cowan’s leadership on several major issues.

Roger Cowan initially regarded Bateman as a valuable addition to the Board. Over time, however, their relationship deteriorated as their views on governance, strategic planning and the future direction of Panthers diverged. In later reflections Cowan came to believe that Bateman’s growing public profile and political ambitions influenced some of his decisions within Panthers. That interpretation forms part of Cowan’s perspective presented throughout this work rather than an established historical fact.

Bateman was also a key player in disputes centred on the governance of clubs amalgamating with Panthers and the subsequent Temby Inquiry making him one of the most consequential participants in the latter stages of the narrative.

Legacy

John Bateman’s contribution to Penrith extends beyond his involvement with Panthers. As a solicitor, councillor and Mayor, he played an important role in the civic development of the city and was widely recognised for his commitment to the local community.

Within Panthers, however, his legacy is inseparable from one of the organisation’s most divisive periods.

Some sections of the Penrith community regarded him as an independent director prepared to challenge existing leadership and defend the club’s independence during an uncertain period for rugby league. Others saw him as one of the principal figures behind governance disputes that consumed the organisation during the closing years of Roger Cowan’s administration.

Whatever view readers ultimately take, John Bateman’s influence on the events described in Panthers, Passion & Politics was substantial. His decisions, alliances and leadership helped shape the governance conflicts that defined a critical chapter in Panthers’ history.

Sources used to prepare this profile: Advocacy Australia Website; Bateman Battersby Website;

Related Topics

Related Themes:

Football Club · Conflict · Board Decisions · Governance

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Editorial Note

This profile is presented as contextual background.
Additional material may be introduced as the narrative progresses.

The Myth of the Footy Five

Part 37 of 70 — Original Chapter: Chapter 11: A Strange Response to a Lifeline

This article forms part of the serialised republication of Panthers, Passion & Politics – The Roger Cowan Years.

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Few Board decisions carried greater significance than the one made late in July 1999. Panthers’ place in the national competition may have depended upon it. It was life or death in rugby league, says Cowan

Panthers losing its place in the NRL competition would have been a disaster, yet here we have a board refusing to talk about it, and refusing to sign something that would have given the club more time.

Sometimes I would have daydreams about the Footy Five attitude1. I imagined them deciding to dive into a pool from the high tower. They would climb to the top, look down and discover that all the water had drained out of the pool. This was new information. But they had already made a decision, and why would they change it just because of new information? So they had dived anyway. As they plummeted downwards, they were studying a book entitled Corporate Governance. It was open at the chapter about considering all the available information and making decisions in the best interests of the organisation.

There was only one downside to signing that letter. Extending the deadline would have allowed the media to continue its speculations, and this, in turn, would have continued to foster divisions in community attitude.

If it had been signed, it is certain that the subject would have been raised again in Penrith Council, perhaps with some questions to Bateman and aspiring councillor Evans, who had previously served and was known to many on council.2

If it had been signed, there would have been no Footy Five campaign, no full-page ads from Ron Mulock attacking Cowan and the other four directors. And there would never have been what Cowan regarded as the biggest myth of all — that the Footy Five and Mulock had saved the Panthers.

There would never have been a ‘Board Wars’ story on the front-page of the Western Weekender. And the Footy Five may never have lost their seats on the Board.

Panthers Board, management, and staff – including the Five themselves – would have avoided much pain.

It is also likely that Panthers would have been spared the enormous costs – in money, time, spirit and lost business – of the Temby inquiry. The NSW government might have been spared a useless exercise which cost it millions of dollars, and the respect of the club industry.

It never occurred to Cowan that there could have been any misunderstanding about the non-binding nature of the document.

Despite all the encouragement I had given the management team trying to have open minds and think creatively, and my own understanding of the powerful impact paradigms can have, it never entered my mind that anyone could fail to understand. I tried so hard to explain it. The document itself seemed so plain.

In September 1999, Ron Mulock sought to publish a full-page advertisement in two local newspapers. It supported his position on the merger situation and was highly critical of Cowan. The Penrith Press declined to run the ad, saying they considered it defamatory. The Western Weekender ran it. 

The ad described a document that had ‘fallen off the back of a truck’ to come into his hands. It was a copy of the letter to NRL chairman Malcolm Noad, signed by Denis Fitzgerald – and with a space for Roger Cowan’s signature. The Mulock ad quotes from the document:

‘This submission creates no obligation on our clubs to conclude the joint venture’.

The ad also noted the document to be confidential.

Editor’s Note: Following the Board’s July 1999 decision, the merger issue unexpectedly returned to public debate — the full-page advertisment mentioned here was not what sparked the return, three weeks earlier a press release lit the fire. The Historical Context article — Resurrecting the Merger Debate — examines the exchange of letters and public statements between Roger Cowan and Ron Mulock and links to the Digital Archive containing the original documents.

So, how did this confidential document get from the Panthers boardroom into his hands?

Greg Evans told the Inquiry there had been a split in the Board between those who didn’t want to merge at any cost, and those that were willing to accept the merger. Ian Temby asked if ‘the former group would have rather seen the Panthers cease to compete in the top competition than merge?’

Evans answers: ‘I can’t speak for them, but I probably would have.’

Yet the theme that resounds through Evans’ evidence is his passion for rugby league. This, he claims, first prompted him to stand for the board, and to lobby board members when vacancies became available. Yet his evidence appears difficult to reconcile with that passion. He told the Inquiry he would probably have preferred Panthers to leave the competition rather than merge to ensure top grade games continues to be played by a Panthers team at Penrith Stadium.

Mulock’s attack in the Weekender initiated the myth of the Footy Five, as Cowan explains:

He divided the Board into two groups and labelled one group the Footy Five. He was claiming the high ground for them, saying it was they who would save the club. He denigrated the three directors who had voted in favour of signing the non-binding letter.

So the very concept of a Footy Five, from the first day it was invented, was a total misconception.  I call it Mulock’s myth.

As for his other claims, there was no split on the Board about retaining our identity in rugby league. Chairman Barry Walsh has said many times, there was no vote on a merger. The only vote was about signing a non-binding letter.

What did Evans have in mind when he told the inquiry that there were some directors willing to accept a merger? Did he really believe something for which there is no evidence anywhere, or was he just having difficulty in breaking out of his paradigms?

A myth that Cowan had signed the letter grew in the wake of Mulock’s attack, linked to claims he wanted a merger and that Cowan was anti-rugby-league.

Roy Masters disagrees.

I saw that letter, and it was signed by one person, and it was not Roger Cowan.  I don’t know how hard he pushed it, but he didn’t push it so far that he signed that document.

The claims by Mick Kelly and others that Ron Mulock and/or the Footy Five had saved the Panthers from extinction are not borne out by the events of the time. The dogmatic stance taken by the Five could easily have spelled the end for the Panthers team.

North Sydney’s misfortunes during 1999 ultimately played a decisive role in saving Penrith. Norths’ stadium on the Central Coast was supposed to open for the 1999 season, but it rained in Gosford almost non-stop for months. The club had vacated its home ground at North Sydney oval, so all its home games had to be played as away games. What should have been a bumper season became a financial disaster for them.

It had been a well-kept secret that North Sydney had financial problems. Towards the end of the 1999 Season, they announced they were going into receivership, and thus had no chance of competing in the NRL on their own. The club formed a joint venture with Manly, and Penrith moved into 14th position. That day, for the first time, Penrith became assured of its place. For some months Cowan had been aware that Norths’ misfortune was helping to close the gap for Penrith. It was a tight tussle on the criteria ladder.

Cowan remained apprehensive right up until the final decision that ensured Panthers’ place in the fourteen-team competition. Three possibilities worried him. Firstly, Norths could – and probably would – finish in front of Penrith on the criteria score. Secondly, even if Penrith was only slightly ahead, grants of $20 million by two governments — given the political push to have a team at Gosford – might have somehow been included in the formula to push the advantage back to Norths. Finally, if Norths merged with Souths it would create an entirely new entity to take the 14th spot.

Each of those possibilities would have been the end of Panthers.

Cowan finally breathed a sigh of relief when Norths chose Manly as its partner. Manly had long been assured of a place, and Norths’ place became vacant for Penrith.

Panthers had survived — but only because events entirely outside the club’s control had unexpectedly changed the criteria race.

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  1. Editorial note: Footy Five is used here — and elsewhere — as retrospective shorthand. The name became associated with these five directors during the later Board conflict and election, rather than during the events being described here. See Beyond the Book — The Footy Five: A Name That Rewrote the Story.
    ↩︎
  2. This paragraph refers to John Bateman and Greg Evans two of the Panthers Board who were included, by Ron Mulock, in a group he called the Footy Five. ↩︎

← Part 36 · All Parts · Part 38 →

Commentary and Contributions

Political Ambition

A removed section from the original Chapter 11: A Strange Response to a Lifeline. The following section presents one theory Roger Cowan developed as he tried to understand decisions that had never fully made sense to him. It is an invitation into his thinking on the puzzle and should be read as his interpretation rather than an established historical conclusion.

Relatively speaking, John Bateman was a figure in the public eye in Penrith. In 1993, Sydney won the right to stage the Olympic Games in 2000.  Just over a year later, John Bateman was elected to Penrith council. Soon after that he was appointed to fill a vacancy on the Penrith Rugby League Club board. At first glance these events appear unrelated. To Roger Cowan, however, they gradually formed part of a much larger picture.

Bateman, a member of the Labor Party, ran as an independent against Pat Sheehy – an endorsed Labor candidate. As a result, Bateman was expelled from the Party. Pat Sheehy is a long-time Penrith councillor. He believes there is little doubt that Bateman’s great ambition at the time was to be mayor at the time of the Olympics.

By all accounts, Bateman did an excellent job in that position.

Penrith councillor Jackie Greenow said the Olympics were a wonderful opportunity for Penrith, and Bateman was a good choice at the time.

John is a sporting nut, and he did an outstanding job representing council, Penrith and the entire community. He was meeting with dignitaries such as Princess Anne and Juan Antonio Samaranch, and he put in an enormous amount of work.

Roger Cowan agrees. ‘John Bateman was one of the best mayors we ever had’, he says.

While Pat Sheehy questions Cowan’s judgement on this point, he says ‘Other people could have done it, but probably not with the pizzazz that John Bateman did.’

For many years, mayors of Penrith had been restricted to a one-year term, following a ten-year stint by one mayor in the 70s. After Bateman had served his one year in 1999, he would normally have stepped aside for someone else.

Pat Sheehy explains.

John Bateman became mayor when he did simply because he had the numbers, and it was the year before the Olympics. There was a full council election in September 1999, and the Labor party effectively gained control. But the party decided that it was in the city’s best interest for John to continue as mayor in 2000, if that’s what he wanted to do, because of all the lead-up work he’d been involved in, and all the things that would carry over from September 1999 to the Olympics in September 2000. The other thing was that at that time, there was no-one else on council that could have done the job as well as he did it.

In my mind, there is absolutely no doubt that this is what John wanted more than anything in the world.

The events surrounding the emerging conflict in the Panthers boardroom naturally caused Cowan to search for reasons.

Over time I came to suspect that the real problem with signing it was that the media would start speculating again about ‘done deals’, for the purpose of grabbing headlines. It struck me that publicity indicating Panthers was about to merge with Parramatta, no matter how untrue, was not in the interests of either Bateman or Evans. With council elections looming and a decision to be made about who would be mayor in the Olympics year, it was probably the last thing they would want.

Statements that they believed signing the letter would have resulted in a merger leave a big question mark. How could it have ever led to a merger if the Five were against it? They had the majority vote.

I tried at the time to come up with an alternative to my growing belief that this whole rugby league issue, right from the time it was reported that Panthers was at serious risk, had been about political ambitions.

Their refusal to discuss strategies for reducing the risk generated powerful negative feelings in me. The feeling that it was all about politics and not about Panthers became a deep-seated festering sore in my psyche, even though I had no way of knowing if I was correct. It was this suppressed anger and frustration that caused me to explode in meetings from time to time.

Even in retrospect, I struggle to clean such a cynical view from my mind. I realise that if my interpretation had been correct, it would mean the catalyst for the enormous cost over the last few years to Panthers and to me had nothing to do with rugby league.

I can see one major flaw in my cynicism. To be a complete theory it would need an explanation of Mulock’s involvement. Having agonised over this one question for six or seven years, I could not find any explanation that made sense.

There is no solid evidence. The more objective view of a reader who was not closely involved may help find more generous conclusions.

Related Topics

Related Themes

Conflict · Board Decisions

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A Lifeline Rejected

Part 36 of 70 — Original Chapter: Chapter 11: A Strange Response to a Lifeline

This article forms part of the serialised republication of Panthers, Passion & Politics – The Roger Cowan Years.

Start · Reader’s Guide · All Parts

Panthers was running out of time.

With only days remaining before the deadline for NRL amalgamations, the club appeared destined to miss the cut for the new fourteen-team competition. Then, unexpectedly, a possible lifeline arrived.

It required nothing more than the signing of a non-binding letter.

The Board rejected it.

Through the first half of 1999, Penrith continued to sit at number fifteen in the NRL criteria. The deadline for amalgamations was midnight on 31 July.1

Commentators had labelled a merger between Parramatta and Penrith was a ‘done deal’. Community concern was mounting. Two Panthers directors with ambitions in local politics, John Bateman and Greg Evans, were sitting between a rock and a hard place.2

Late in July, Cowan received a call from rugby league headquarters concerning the deadline.

Penrith was still highly regarded in the Super League circles,3 and they were trying to do anything possible to assist us. It was obvious to everyone that we were in dire trouble. We sat solidly at number fifteen, and that didn’t look like changing. Nobody knew what was happening at Norths.

The call suggested that we could at least maintain a fallback position if we were prepared to sign a letter saying that we were still considering a merger with Parramatta and requesting more time.  The letter would very clearly state that it was not to be taken as any commitment to a merger.  It would be a non-binding document, aimed solely at keeping our options alive.

In his evidence to the Inquiry, John Bateman spoke of the events of July 1999. He said that when Cowan presented this offer to the board on 31 July, the Board resolved not to sign the letter. Bateman also spoke of his frustration concerning a paper that Cowan presented to the Board on 20 July, with the latest information on joint ventures.

 Bateman said:

In the previous September we had resolved to stand alone. That was our view, and then Roger tabled this paper giving us more information and basically telling us that we were in a risky position standing alone.

From a corporate governance perspective, directors are expected to receive and consider information that may materially affect the organisation. Why, then, would the presentation of updated information about such an important issue become a source of frustration?  A CEO who withheld such vital information would be guilty of poor corporate governance.4

On 31 July Cowan called a special meeting to advise the Board that there had been an offer that would overcome the need to comply with the 31 July deadline. Panthers would simply need to sign a non-binding letter addressed to NRL Chairman, Malcolm Noad. Cowan suggested to the Board that there was nothing to lose by signing it.

The document at the centre of the 31 July 1999 special Board meeting. Click image to read.

Bateman was not the only one who was angered by the presentation of the non-binding letter. The ex-wife of Greg Evans remembers how very stressed her husband was before leaving for that 31 July meeting.

Why these two directors reacted angrily to a non-binding proposal that would keep the Club’s options open remains a deep mystery. Cowan developed an interesting theory about it, which seems to be borne out by some seemingly unrelated events of the 1990s.

He came to believe that the concern could not have had anything to do with merging because it was a non-binding letter and the Footy Five had the numbers to prevent any merger any time they liked. He started to wonder if the problem was just the publicity.5

Greg Evans shed some unexpected light on the events of July 1999. He was adamant that none of the Five had believed that the document was actually non-binding.

I really believed that signing that letter was signing to merge with Parramatta. So did the others.

I believe if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then that’s what it is. It might have said non-binding, but once we signed it, we were going to merge. The NRL were putting enormous pressure on everyone, standing over teams, trying to force amalgamations. It was very bad PR for teams to die completely, so it was in their interest to push.

There was debate and discussion that night, but when the letter was discussed by the entire board, the fact that it was non-binding did not come into the discussion. Every member of that board believed it was an agreement to amalgamate.

Another of the Five, Geoff James, agreed with Evans, saying his view was ‘dead right’.

It might seem difficult for some readers to believe that anyone could misread such a letter.  It was a simple one-page document. There it is on the opposite page! Leo Armstrong, Barry Walsh, Keith Rhind and Terry Heidtmann had no doubt that it really was a non-binding agreement.

The committee had representation from local councils, and from local community organizations and businesses, as well as people from Panthers management and Board. The purpose of the committee was to devise strategies that would convince the league decision makers that they could not drop Penrith.

The other three members of the Footy Five group were asked in writing if they agreed with Greg Evans’ view. Dennis Coffey did not respond.

Craig Terry says he had a different perspective on the incident. The document said non-binding, he recalls.

But my view was that signing that document would signal that we were prepared to reopen the issue

It was an important document, and we had no legal advice to say what it actually meant. It did say ‘non-binding’, but what it said was not the main issue. We had made policy determinations that said ‘no’.

Later John Bateman wrote that whilst the document was non-binding, he felt that signing it would bring about a merger. Cowan says it would be easy to jump to conclusion about Evans and James when they claimed that the document was a binding agreement, but he believes it is possible they actually believed what they were saying.

If Evans and James genuinely believed the document committed Panthers to a merger, then an obvious question follows. How could intelligent and experienced people read a document that repeatedly described itself as “non-binding” and nevertheless conclude it required a merger?

The contradiction is difficult to ignore. The letter before the Board imposed no immediate legal obligation and expressly preserved Panthers’ ability to make future decisions. Yet some directors clearly believed it represented something much more significant.

Before considering one possible explanation for this apparent contradiction, it is worth pausing to appreciate just how differently the same document was being interpreted.

Cowan suggests an explanation comes from the author Joel Barker whose book The Business of Paradigms, explains that people interpret information through mental frameworks — beliefs and patterns of thinking. These mental frameworks, or paradigms, cause people to fail to see evidence that goes against their beliefs.

Barker says that even experienced scientists sometimes fail to see clear evidence, although it might be right before their eyes, if it is in conflict with what they expected to see, or what they believed.6

According to Cowan if directors came to that special meeting with the firm belief that they were being asked to vote on merging with Parramatta they could have been “trapped by their own paradigms”.

My argument that it was non-binding and that we had nothing to lose would have fallen on deaf ears.

From the Footy Five point of view, a decision not to sign may have had certain advantages, no matter what different reasons each of them had for not signing. Perhaps it was just plain old-fashioned good luck — make a silly mistake and it comes back to reward you.

Had they analysed the situation and concluded there was nothing to lose except some unwanted media speculation, it would have been difficult to justify not signing it. As directors they had a duty to do what was best for the business, and what rational argument could there be against keeping all the options open for as long as possible?

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  1. Only the top 14 ranked teams were to be included, amalgamated entities were guaranteed a spot – so this deadline had great relevance for Penrith.
    ↩︎
  2. Roger Cowan believed the political ambitions of both John Bateman and Greg Evans may have influenced the way they approached issues surrounding the merger debate. His reasoning is explored further in the accompanying Removed Section — Political Ambition.
    ↩︎
  3. Although Roger refers to “Super League circles”, he is really referring to senior figures associated with News Limited and the Super League organisation.
    ↩︎
  4. The Australian Institute of Company Directors identifies keeping directors informed of matters that may materially affect the organisation as one of the CEO’s fundamental governance responsibilities.
    ↩︎
  5. Roger Cowan eventually developed an alternative explanation for why this apparently harmless document generated such strong opposition. It is explored in the accompanying Removed Section — Political Ambition.
    ↩︎
  6. “Paradigms” was a subject often covered in training sessions at Panthers thoughout the 1990s. One of the videos consistently used is available on YouTube was Joel Barker’s Discovering the Future: The Business of Paradigms. It runs for about 40 minutes and shows how easy it is for thinking patterns to create perceptions that don’t match the evidence. ↩︎

← Part 35 · All Parts · Part 37 →

Commentary and Contributions

An Information Night — Weaponised

Part 34 of 70 — Original Chapter: Chapter 10: A Narrow Escape from Football Oblivion

This article forms part of the serialised republication of Panthers, Passion & Politics – The Roger Cowan Years.

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Two weeks later, Penrith Council joined the fight. A resolution was passed at a council meeting to send a letter to Panthers urging them to stand alone. Several councillors spoke in support of the motion, emphasising both the importance of the football team to Penrith’s identity and the economic value it brought to the city. One councillor suggested that the council ‘should let the NRL know where we are and urge Panthers to stand firm’.1

Council’s stance created a whole new dynamic. Two Panthers directors had council links. One, John Bateman, was already on council and it was common knowledge that he had his eye on the mayoral seat for the following year. His ally, Greg Evans had been a councillor in the early 90s, and was campaigning to be re-elected in the next council election.

Throughout most of the Penrith community, the issue sparked passion and emotion, and massive amounts of rhetoric, but there seemed to be little understanding or acceptance of the reality of the situation.

Ron Mulock, a former deputy premier of NSW and Penrith mayor, had been the club patron since its early days. He passionately opposed even the thought of a merger with any other team. He is quoted many times as saying he ‘would rather die on his sword’, than merge.

Through the club’s early days, Cowan had enjoyed a friendly relationship with Mulock. They were joint architects of the project to establish Penrith’s Police Citizens Boys’ Club as a joint venture between the council and the club. It was the first boys’ club of its kind in Australia to be built without the need for public fund-raising.

Board chairman Barry Walsh had also been a longtime friend of Mulock. When the Parramatta merger became an issue, this all changed. Walsh speaks of a day when Mulock arrived at his house, very upset and behaving in a rude and aggressive manner. It was a side to his character that Walsh had not seen. It was also a shock to Walsh’s wife who had always been a staunch Mulock supporter.

Walsh tried to explain the situation to Mulock. He understood the patron’s concerns, and wanted to reassure him. He suggested that if he would attend a board meeting, he would see for himself that the directors had no intention whatsoever of approving a merger. Mulock refused the invitation.

The Board decided to hold a public meeting to inform the members – and the team’s fans and supporters exactly what was going on. Its purpose was not to seek a decision, but to explain the situation facing the club and answer questions from members and supporters.

Cowan was to address the meeting held on 7 September 1998, but was quite unprepared for what happened.

I was aware of the controversy out in the community. We had just come through the whole Super League saga and people were very emotional about any possibility of merging with another club. But there was so much misinformation flying around. The board had agreed that our members and supporters should be given a factual analysis of the situation.

I decided to test my address on about eight of our managers. I was going to speak from notes to make sure that the message would not change on the night, no matter what. I asked them to look for any possible bias in what I was saying.  I wanted to present both sides of the problem. They needed to understand that it was essential to fully investigate the situation.

If we decided to remain as a stand alone club there was, at that time, a very strong chance we would have no team in the NRL competition. If we decided to merge with another club, there would be a different set of negative results. They needed to have the full story.

I made a few changes on the advice of the management team, but we were confident that the message was objective and honest.

Rather than reducing uncertainty, the meeting fundamentally changed the course of the debate.

Cowan has described the meeting as an ambush. He says he and the board executive were completely caught by surprise.  After Cowan addressed the meeting, Ron Mulock took the podium. Cowan says it was a moment he will never forget.

He was shouting and ranting about lies and corruption and saying all sorts of crazy stuff, and it seemed to be mostly aimed at me. He attacked four members of the board, carrying on that they had 80 years experience between them. He was even adding up their ages. The tirade went on and on. He made the “rather die on my sword” comment, and told the meeting that the league would never drop Penrith from the competition. Souths used the same questionable rationale and were dropped from the competition a few months later.

This was a public forum, and Cowan says he could not believe Mulock’s extraordinary behavior.

Later, I wondered about the reasons for the personal attacks. He was speaking as if he had come prepared for a debate, and it sounded as if he believed that I would be advocating a merger, and that I would be supported by some directors. If this really was the case, he had been badly misled.

This was the most troubling aspect of the whole thing. The Board had voted unanimously against any merger, but he was acting as if he had been told something very different.

His behaviour on that night was just another piece of a jigsaw puzzle.

There was another strange aspect to this forum.

John Bateman, responding to written questions sent in late 2006, said that the decision by members at the 7 September meeting was the reason he had continued his ‘stand alone’ stance.2

But this was not a proper members’ meeting.

A meeting of members for the purpose of making decisions would have required notices being mailed to all members three weeks in advance. This was nothing more than an information forum. Non-members were allowed to attend. Less than 350 people attended. There was no vote taken.

At the meeting the Five took the opportunity to declare their determination to stand alone despite a few weeks earlier having agreed to look at all options.

The following night’s board meeting virtually ensured there would be no further discussion on the subject. The continuing rationale for such a closed stance was that the members had spoken and that was what the members wanted. The fact is that many thousands of members would not even have been aware the meeting was held. The Board had taken no measure of members’ views.
.

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  1. The position adopted by the Council was very interesting. Since at least 1994, research had been regularly done and the exposure and value the Penrith Rugby League team brought to the local community was an integral part of that research. Yet until this point the Council had failed to acknowledge that value in any way. In fact, it often seemed that certain councillors and council officers resented the thought that it was Panthers bringing Penrith growing visibility.
    ↩︎
  2. This belief was express in correspondence from John Bateman to Jennie Bentley dated 7th Januray 2007. On tis issue Bateman says:
    … it was my view that the members “had spoken” on 7 September 1998 and I was happy to uphold their direction to
    the board to “stand alone”    . ↩︎

← Part 33 · All Parts · Part 35 →

Commentary and Contributions

A Good Story Trumps Truth

Part 33 of 70 — Original Chapter: Chapter 10: A Narrow Escape from Football Oblivion

This article forms part of the serialised republication of Panthers, Passion & Politics – The Roger Cowan Years.

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As discussions quietly continued between Penrith and Parramatta, a very different story was beginning to circulate publicly.

It was not long after the two clubs began their talks that the media speculation began. Cowan says there was a great deal of misinformation, with many comments proving to be wide of the mark.

On one occasion someone announced on Ray Hadley’s rugby league radio show that the merger of Penrith and Parramatta was a ‘done deal’. There was no truth in that statement, but it stirred up a hornet’s nest in Penrith. People believed if they heard it on the Hadley program it must be true.

Denis Fitzgerald bears this out. ‘It was never a done deal,’ he says. ‘Far from it.’

As the old media adage goes, “don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story.” In this case, rumour was rapidly overtaking reality.

Editor’s Note: The merger debate was reported week by week through local newspapers, particularly the Western Weekender. Readers interested in following the controversy as it unfolded at the time can do so in the Historical Context article Following the Merger Debate.

Rumours flew that Cowan had already made a secret agreement with Parramatta. The rumours were soon repeated by others, including some who understood how football clubs operated and should have appreciated that no chief executive could make such a decision alone.

Perhaps the most surprising assumption was that I could somehow make such a decision on my own. Businesses simply do not operate that way. The board of directors has total power over decisions that affect the members they represent.

Mick Kelly, who writes for the Western Weekender, still pushes the story that I was the one who had to be defeated to avoid the merger.1 While the agendas of some people would later become obvious, Kelly’s rigid stance is still difficult to understand. He has some experience in the way clubs work, so he must have known that what he was saying was untrue. At the time of merger discussions, he was well aware of the alliance of five directors. This was the group who would later claim to be the Footy Five and it included the owner of the newspaper that employed him. They held a majority of five of the nine votes, so nothing could happen that they did not support. Kelly had to know that.

The truth is, they only needed four votes to stop a merger.

There is one little known fact about this episode. Cowan had suggested a further safeguard — instead of a decision by simple majority, the votes of at least six directors should be required for  a decision in favour of merging with another club. Of course, the alliance of five could have used its majority to strengthen this even further had they deemed it necessary — they could have made a unanimous vote as the safeguard.

It was a practical safeguard that made it even less plausible that a merger could occur without overwhelming Board support.

Kelly’s ‘rigid stance’ on the issue continues to this day. During the course of the research for this book, the author was told by a couple of people that he [Kelly] had some important evidence to present that would prove that Cowan wanted a merger with Parramatta. Apparently, the evidence is in the form of a taped interview in which the Panthers CEO had said he thought that a merger with Parramatta was the way to go.

Questioned on this point, Cowan says depending on the time of the interview, and the circumstances — and of course the context — it is very possible.

They were some very desperate moments during those years. I have said all along that a merger was preferable to seeing Panthers disappear from the rugby league scene altogether. I never stepped back from that belief. I could not understand the opposing belief that it would be better to “die on our swords”. When the board would not even discuss such an important issue, it made me very suspicious that something strange was going on behind the scenes.

Panthers group chairman Barry Walsh calls the merger story a ‘storm in a teacup’, because — as far as he and the rest of the Board was concerned — it was never going to happen. There was no need for the high drama and the media beat-ups. Attempts to investigate the options carefully, maintain a low profile and not raise controversy in the community were being undermined by media speculation that had no foundation in fact.

In July, the Western Weekender, a local newspaper owned by director Greg Evans, ran a story on its front page advocating a ‘stand alone’ position for the Club. On 2 August, the story broke in the Sunday Telegraph. It said that a merger between the two clubs was ‘set to become reality next year’. It said the team would be called the Parramatta Panthers, and would play in blue and gold, the Parramatta colours. The story featured quotes from Denis Fitzgerald, but none from Roger Cowan, or indeed anyone from the Panthers club. But it was enough to set things in motion in the city of Penrith
.

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  1. Mick Kelly no longer writes for the Western Weekender. like many of the protagonists in this chapter of the Panthers story he undoubdtedly maintains his view. ↩︎

← Part 32 · All Parts · Part 34 →

Commentary and Contributions

Outlining the Risk for the Board

Part 32 of 70 — Original Chapter: Chapter 10: A Narrow Escape from Football Oblivion

This article forms part of the serialised republication of Panthers, Passion & Politics – The Roger Cowan Years.

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Considering the possible contingency responses was one thing. Recommending a course of action to the Board was another. By early 1998 management believed it could no longer treat the issue as a theoretical exercise.

By early 1998, Cowan says he and Levy had reached an unavoidable conclusion.

We came to the conclusion – we just have to do something, otherwise Panthers is going to disappear off the face of the earth as far as rugby league is concerned

We were in a weak bargaining position because it was quite obvious that we could not make it under the criteria.  If we started negotiations early enough, we could use the strength of the Panther brand and our junior league to reinforce our position. Waiting until we missed selection would leave us nothing more than a takeover target. If we had to merge it should be as an equal partner. Then, at least, half of our games would still be played in Penrith and the Panther brand would continue to strengthen.

Together they prepared their first formal recommendation to the Board—that Panthers should at least begin exploring the possibility of a merger with Parramatta.

Every chief executive has a duty to advise the Board of risks that may threaten the organisation’s future. Failing to do so would represent a serious dereliction of responsibility. Equally important is the obligation to identify available options and make appropriate recommendations. If Panthers genuinely faced exclusion from the national competition, management had a duty to ensure the Board understood both the risks and the possible responses.

Management’s recommendation was not that Panthers should merge with another club. Rather, it was that the Board should investigate every realistic contingency before circumstances removed those choices. If the club’s worst fears were realised, directors would then be able to make an informed decision from a position of preparation rather than desperation.

Between 1995 and1999, the structure of the Panthers board changed dramatically. John Bateman, who had been elected to Penrith Council in 1995, was appointed to a board vacancy in the same year. He had worked well in what had been a strong and cohesive board. But between 1997 and 1999, three seats became available on the Board. They were filled by Craig Terry, Greg Evans and Dennis Coffey, some of whom had social and business ties with Bateman.

Cowan began to feel a change in the attitude of long-term director Geoff James who seemed to be developing a close alliance with the other four. Before long, the removal of long-serving Chairman Leo Armstrong would point to the existence of a faction for the first time in the Panthers history. In answer to a question in 2007, John Bateman insisted that there never was a faction, except in his final year on the Board, 2002.

Despite the changed board dynamics at Penrith, both Penrith and Parramatta
were willing to discuss all options in the early stages of negotiations. Neither board really wanted to amalgamate, as Cowan explains,

Had there been a vote at Parramatta the outcome may have been a small minority in favour. We know what the vote at Penrith would have been and there is absolutely no doubt about it – nine directors against amalgamation and none in favour. That never, ever changed.

So, if that was the case, what was the point of discussing it at all? And why was there a softer attitude towards amalgamation at Parramatta
than there was at Penrith? Probably, the main reason was that for Parramatta, it was never a life and death decision.

For us, it was. All the facts that Mark and I had presented to the board showed that we were in critical danger of not being in the competition. We were way behind in the criteria stakes and the teams would be only selected on the basis of criteria points. Confronted by such evidence, it would have been totally irresponsible for a board to sit back and do nothing. All the directors were prepared to look at options, but not one of them would have voted in favour.

Mark and I believed we had a responsibility to make sure the board was fully informed about the risks. We could keep putting off any decision until the last possible moment but if we had nothing planned by the time the axe started to fall it would be too late.

There was some strong logic behind the Penrith directors’ total opposition to amalgamation. Parramatta was in a much stronger negotiating position and some felt that it would be more of a takeover than an amalgamation.

My discussions with Denis Fitzgerald were never in that vein, however. In fact, our discussions were only ever about how we could set up a new club with equal ownership that would be the strongest club in the competition. If we were to be simply taken over, the option of buying naming rights would be a better commercial decision because it would leave open the possibility of fighting for reinstatement through the courts

So, all nine Panthers directors were adamantly opposed to any such idea, but they generally agreed that there could be no harm in opening discussions with Parramatta.

Significantly, there were no objections, even from the five directors who would eventually claim recognition as the ‘Footy Five’. A couple of joint board meetings of the two clubs were held around August that year. The first was hosted in the Panthers boardroom over dinner. Everything went reasonably smoothly, and it was decided that Parramatta would host the next meeting.

It was clear at these meetings that neither directors nor managers from either club were over the moon about the prospect of amalgamating. At that stage, both clubs were still prepared to examine the possibilities rationally. That would soon change.

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Commentary and Contributions

Preparing for the Worst

Part 31 of 70 — Original Chapter: Chapter 10: A Narrow Escape from Football Oblivion

This article forms part of the serialised republication of Panthers, Passion & Politics – The Roger Cowan Years.

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By this stage, Panthers’ management believed it had three realistic contingency options. Their aim was to have each sufficiently developed before the NRL announced which clubs would survive. 1

One option was to negotiate a favourable merger with another club — a merger that would be a true partnership with equal rights. Half the home games would have to be played in Penrith and the team would have to be called Panthers. Years of consistent marketing had established Panthers as one of the club’s strongest commercial assets, giving it value in any merger negotiations.

Another option was to buy the naming rights of another club. It would have been little consolation to Panther supporters to have a Melbourne Panthers or a St George Panthers, but from a purely commercial point of view it would have been better than having the Panther brand completely eliminated from the competition.

The other option was to prepare for a legal fight based on the fraudulent activities of some clubs in their claims under the criteria. How could the criteria be used for selection if it could be proved that several clubs had blatantly cheated? And Panthers had that proof2. There were difficulties with this strategy. Court proceedings are inherently uncertain and can take years to resolve. Panthers would almost certainly have been excluded from the competition during that period, making the option financially and operationally damaging.

Although very different in their execution, each option had the same objective.

Management was not searching for reasons to abandon Panthers’ identity. Quite the opposite. Every proposal was an attempt to preserve the Panthers brand and ensure the club remained part of the national competition if the selection criteria ultimately went against them.

If exclusion proved unavoidable, management believed an equal-rights merger offered the best opportunity to preserve both the Panthers identity and a continuing presence in the national competition. But it would be difficult.  A merger could be stalled as long as possible, but the negotiations should not be left so late that they had to be rushed and driven by the desperation of any final decision to cut Panthers. 

The combination of Penrith and Panthers had brought valuable publicity to the city and a strong word association. The loss of that association became one of the strongest objections by those who opposed a merger. From management point of view it was better to salvage the Panthers brand than to finish with nothing at all. To some people, though, nothing at all was better than linking Panthers with another locality.

For management, preserving some future for Panthers was preferable to risking no future at all. For many supporters, however, the very thought of compromise was unacceptable.

There was also an inconsistency in the arguments of some. In their early days with Super League, the Board and management had been discussing the marketing disadvantages of the name Penrith Panthers. 

Some surveys had indicated that having Penrith in the name was detracting from support in nearby population centres such as St Marys, Mt Druitt, and Blacktown. Geographically, these should have been areas of support. Penrith junior league extended as far as Blacktown. Many players were coming out of those areas, yet many people from those areas supported other teams. The Board decided that it might help build support if a name were chosen that allowed people to believe they were supporting a team representative of their own area.

The unanimous decision of the Board was to register the name, ‘Western Sydney Panthers’.

Early in 1998, Cowan and football club CEO Mark Levy began to look closely at the merger possibilities. Options included Western Suburbs, Parramatta, and Balmain. Geographical remoteness was against a merger with Balmain, and for Wests, Canterbury seemed a more suitable choice.  However, the club did have discussions with Western Suburbs.

If the club were forced to merge, Parramatta had to be the most logical choice. It was geographically perfect and the combined strengths of Parramatta and Penrith would have created the most powerful club in the competition. 

Penrith had twelve months to compete for points. Two clubs – the Hunter Mariners and the South Queensland
Crushers – had already dipped out, leaving 20 teams vying for 14 places. 

Denis Fitzgerald agrees. He says that the Parramatta club’s preferred choice for a merger was Balmain.

They were going to struggle to make the criteria, and their district boundary comes to the Clyde/Carlingford railway line here, so it’s quite close to us. A lot of people who live around the Ryde area might support both Parramatta and Balmain. But some of the old Balmain stalwarts felt that we were too strong. I was disappointed when it fell down. I thought maybe Penrith would be too strong themselves, but there could have been a great future in a joint venture with Penrith.

If it had happened, it was going to dominate the whole of western Sydney and all those growth areas. Although there’s some growth in the south-west, the biggest area stretches from Granville/Rydalmere to the lower Blue Mountains. It is a massive area. Commercially, it had great sense, but it was football, where so many positions are not based on logical, commercial reality, but on emotion and tradition — and that’s what ultimately happened.’

Parramatta was interested in a joint venture for a number of reasons but had not made any decision other than to investigate the various options.

The Parramatta Chairman, Alan Overton, sent a letter to his club’s members outlining his reasons for considering the move. In part, it said:

I think all keen, long term Eels fans, like myself, would love the club to continue as we have for the past 50 years, and continue to be the Parramatta Eels, playing at Parramatta Stadium. But … whether we like it or not, there will be only 14 teams in the NRL in 2000.

He went on to say that,

… boards cannot afford to adopt a narrow minded or blinkered approach to joint ventures but rather should attempt to be as objective and professional as possible.

Although their club was safely ensconced in the fourteen, the Parramatta board saw benefits in a merger. The new league administrators were offering major incentives for teams to merge, both on a financial level and in various guarantees. Increased supporter base, sponsorship and gate receipts would be additional benefits. At that time there was great uncertainty about the potential for stand-alone clubs to compete with the joint ventures for more than a few years. Even clubs certain of selection, such as Parramatta, had the nagging doubt that their survival might be for the short term only. Parramatta was taking the responsible course examining all options for its future.

Fitzgerald said the early talks with Cowan were very informal, just chatting more than real discussions.

Roger was concerned with their position — making the criteria. They were in the worst position of any of the Super League franchises. When the curtain went down after one year of Super League and the NRL was formed, Penrith was in a pretty weak position.

For us, it was certainly about the money, and the risk. We had all spent money, but the ARL clubs had never had the type of subsidies that Super League had given its franchises. That funding was now being chopped off with the NRL starting.

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Commentary and Contributions

The End of Season Drinks That Weren’t So Cordial

A removed section from the original Chapter 8: A Taste of Injustice.

The Penrith-Parramatta game was the last home game of the 1984 season. If the Panthers won, it would mean a semi-finals appearance for the first time in the Club’s history.

By half-time it was becoming obvious that the game was not going well. During the second half, Cowan walked across and sat with the chairman, Leo Armstrong.

Cowan commented to Armstrong that it was pretty obvious this would be the last game of the season. He suggested to Armstrong that the success of the team should be acknowledged in some way. They — the CEO and Chairman — agreed to invite the players and officials back to the boardroom after the game.

Cowan admits he had not thought the invitation through carefully enough. Because it was a spur of the moment decision, only a few directors knew about it. At the time, though, it did not seem important.

At the start of the next board meeting, managers were asked to leave the room.

Don Ellks says,

It was the first time we had ever been asked to leave. Roger sat for some moments as if deciding what to do. He did leave, but reluctantly. After a while Leo came outside and said the board had moved a vote of no confidence in him, and that John Hewett had been re-elected as chairman.

The perceived slight on the directors who missed out on the after-game drinks had provided enough leverage for JohnHewett to make a grab for the chairman position he still resented losing. Cowan was in a tight spot. Conflict on the board had been effecting decision making since 1983, to the detriment of the Club.

This change would affect the morale of the management team. The turnover of the Club was increasing rapidly, scarcely a day seemed to pass without discussion of new initiatives, and it was vital to avoid any instability.

Sensitive negotiations were taking place to refinance the Club’s loans in a deal that would save the club hundreds of thousands of dollars. The reputation and experience of Leo Armstrong as a bank manager was an advantage – there was obvious respect for him by the negotiating bank.

One faction of the board, led by Armstrong, was supportive of management. As well, Armstrong was an excellent chairman, highly respected in the community, by staff and by the members. The other faction seemed to be driven by Hewett. He was seen as the leader of that faction, but Cowan believed he was being pushed by another director, Murray Clarke. Of late, these two had lost the respect of management, staff and quite a lot of members. In this instance they were not acting in the interests of the Club. Any publicity about the chairman’s removal had the potential to do damage.

Worse for Cowan was that Armstrong was about to be humiliated because he agreed with one of Cowan’s suggestions.

When the board called me back into the meeting, I had already decided that the resolution could do a great deal of damage. The negative publicity, the reaction of the members, the negative impact on the finance negotiations and the unfair impact on Armstrong’s reputation should be avoided at all costs. Importantly, the club’s constitution did not clearly give the Board the power to remove the Chairman and it needed a legal opinion. I refused to return to the meeting unless he was reinstated, or it went back to the members.

Cowan reminded the board that it was unconstitutional to continue the meeting without the company secretary. When they called on Don Ellks to come in to act as secretary, Ellks also refused.

During the following week, Hewett went to Cowan’s office to advise that the board had appointed him chairman. Cowan told him that he believed it was improper to move a vote of no confidence and damage Armstrong’s reputation over such a trivial issue. He told Hewett that the management team would continue to recognise Armstrong as the chairman unless there was compliance with the constitution and members of the club endorsed the vote of no confidence. A stalemate had been reached.

Soon after, two of the directors from the Hewett faction would resign, and a tentative peace would return to the board with Armstrong in the chair. Under the surface though, hostility continued to bubble. Hewett would seek revenge — and eventually get it. ‘The conflict between the two factions had been damaging the Club for years‘, says Cowan. ‘Now war had been declared in no uncertain terms.‘

The next election, in 1985, was the board’s first ever departure from its traditional practice of presenting itself as one solid unit for re-election. Neither Hewett nor Hubbard were re-elected to the board.

While Hubbard remains ambivalent about the events of those years, he says that Hewett was devastated. It hit him pretty hard, says Hubbard. ‘His health suffered, and I don’t know that he ever really got over it.’

Related Topics

Related Themes

Board Decisions · Conflict· Football Club

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