Whateley: Sacking coaches might be the only thing Essendon are good at

What a dismal day for a sacking.

The Bombers have just become the most embarrassing example of a club offering the full support of the board just before it sacks the coach.

The compulsion of Essendon’s leaders to spread their nonsense publicly rather than keep their council and assess their options was a flawed strategy in real time.

It’s made them look foolish.

At Gather Round the President was declaring the ambition Brad Scott would be the club’s next Premiership coach.

The plan was rock solid.

The notorious Bomber factions wouldn’t knock the club off course.

Nobody asked Andrew Welsh to say it… he did it of his own accord.

Last week, in his first public appearance, the Chief Executive expressed the club’s resolve and backed Brad.

My word is oak. It’s not a sentiment you’d apply to anyone in charge at the Bombers.

They stand exposed as the worst kind of cliché today.

Be quiet, make your assessments, and act when you feel the time has arrived.

Essendon looks like a club that had a plan, but didn’t understand the plan.

Any study of recent rebuilds would have told you this would be the worst year.

The darkest hour necessary to acquire the requisite talent on which the rise will eventually be built.

And in the darkest hour there will be a lot of losing. The Bombers didn’t make it to the halfway mark of the season.

Like Carlton, Essendon’s long suit is sacking coaches. It might be the only thing they’re good at.

The universal truth is there’s a level of losing that can’t be absorbed. It causes people to flinch and buckle… and break their word.

Regime change a few years back attempted to break away from Old Essendon and reinvent the club for the modern era.

That has failed.

The President is gone, the chief executive is gone and now the coach is gone.

Old Essendon is being restored.

There’s a lot of cuteness around words today, but this was the Andrew Welsh quote: “We’re of absolute belief that Brad will be our next premiership coach.”

Welsh used it to stare down those who thought that could cause disruption for the path we are on. And almost as soon as those words were uttered the undercurrent began undermining Brad Scott.

Do what you need to do, but don’t say it when it’s not true.

My word is oak… it’s not something you could say about Essendon.