“It’s a disgrace”: Watson fires up over Tauru situation

Tim Watson finds the Alix Tauru situation “uneasy” and “unpalatable”.

It was reported by Tom Morris that the emerging St Kilda player has toured the facilities at the Gold Coast Suns as he seeks a path out of Moorabbin.

Watson is not fan of young contracted players having their heads turned by rival clubs.

“I find it uneasy and unpalatable,” he said on SEN Breakfast.

“That you can have a kid in his second year of football, who has played 19 games, who has another year on his contract, and we are saying that it’s ok that he’s actually walking through other facilities, tyre kicking them, to see whether or not that’s where he wants to spend the next five years.

“That’s unpalatable to fans. We’ve got to look after fans, that’s what we have to look after in this game.”

Garry Lyon agrees.

He wants to see draftees who clubs invest in stay for the entirety of their initial contract, at the very least.

“You and I are both in the same opinion. If you are down the bottom of the ladder and you take a kid in the first round, they then get a three-year contract,” Lyon said.

“I think that should be non-negotiable, off limits, that player stays at that club for three years. Then it is incumbent upon on you to be as good a club as you can be, develop the kid as well as you can, develop the relationship with the family, so by the end of that three years, halfway through the third year, they go, ‘Yeah, I love this club, I wanna stay here, let's sign for another five’.

“Or by the end of that three years, the player is then entitled to go, ‘Look, I haven't felt comfortable, I don't think you've coached me well or developed me well, I think your facilities are subpar, your medical team's not working’, whatever, at the end of that three years he's entitled to go.

“Because they don't get a say in where they go. It is a big investment for the club, so for Alix Tauru to be touring another club's facilities in his second year as a first-round pick, I think that's got to be outlawed.”

Watson believes this type of behaviour would be penalised in other codes, labelling it a “disgrace”.

“It sits uncomfortably with me that they're able to do this,” Watson said further.

“He’s, I'll say flagrantly, touring another team's facility. The Gold Coast are facilitating this tour of their facility and probably other clubs now have the idea that maybe this kid is gettable.

“And the game accepts this.

“I know this is not the NFL, but if this happened in the NFL, the player would get an enormous fine, so too would the club who's trying to entice him. It would be a massive fine, but for whatever reason we don't care about this sort of stuff.

“But the point here is, the fan does. St Kilda fans will care about this because what you have as a fan is the hope of the future and the optimism that you invest in your team thinking that you are going to see some kid develop and become a star of your team one day.

“It is a disgrace that we accept that this is the behaviour that you can conduct.”

Lyon doubled down on his stance relating to length of stay after draft.

“So if the AFL were to come out at the end of this trade period or before the draft and say, ‘Right, these are the rules, this is what's happening - you take a first-round pick, he cannot leave your club for three years. End of story’,” he added.

“Whether he wants to go or whether you want to trade him.

“We will enforce this to the point that if there is an approach made to one of these players in contract, whether it be for three years or two years, by another club, whether it's direct, indirect or not, $500,000 fine and loss of first-round pick.

“Just go bang. So then we're all clear.

“Alix Tauru might not like being there, St Kilda might be frustrated with his lack of discipline, whatever. He's there for three years, work it out.”

Watson concluded: “And at the end of that period of time, at the end of next year, towards the end of next year, if he still wants out of the club, then you can have those discussions.

“I’m not stupid enough to not believe that managers are going to get on the phone and talk to football clubs and try to find out what market value, all that sort of stuff can happen.

“But I think it's completely different to actually march into an opposition club and have a tour while you're currently contracted to another club, and you've got a whole 12 months still to run on your contract.”