Gillon McLachlan believed that the AFL could have taken action which would have prevented the whole saga. McLachlan accepted some responsibility on behalf of the AFL for the saga when he told SEN radio on 28 August 2013:
• “The AFL dropped the ball by not monitoring the Essendon supplement program after advising coach James Hird to steer clear of using peptides in August 2011” • “The fact potentially though that we weren’t out there regularly monitoring is potentially a failing of the AFL.” • “I don’t think that we can shirk it in every instance, I’m happy to take that on the chin in the sense that if we had gone out there every month and monitored it, then maybe we wouldn’t be in this situation.” • “People need to take various forms of accountability and I’ll take that.
Dr Reid claimed that David Evans visited him at home on 1 February 2013 and told him that Demetriou and McLachlan told him that Essendon was about to be named by the Australian Crime Commission.
Hird said “It was then decided [on 5 February 2013] we had to go to the AFL to act – I’m not sure what time we got to the AFL. Got to the AFL and in the board table – in the boardroom was myself, Ian Robson, David Evans, Liz Lukin, who’s our media adviser, was there for part of it, [general manager, communications and digital media, Justin Rodski] was there for part of it, and [Deputy Chief Executive Officer] Gill[on] McLachlan was in the room, and they were discussing the – what we were going to do.”
“I’m not sure who mentioned it, but it was mentioned that the ACC were going to hand down a report; there was going to be a meeting of all the codes and that if we came out earlier then – and invited ASADA – then the AFL investigation would look better for us.
I said to Gill, I said, “Gill, this is wrong. We haven’t taken performance enhancing drugs. If you’re worried about AOD9604, I’ve seen a WADA approval. I’ve – I am almost certain I’ve seen it” and Brett said – went, “they’re not worried about AOD-9604.” I said, “What are you worried about?” and he wouldn’t tell me what it was, and I said to them, “I even have text messages on my phone of products that Steve has talked about.”
And:
ASADA: So, from your perspective, the thing that precipitated the press conference was effectively advice you’d received from the AFL that there was a problem brewing and it was going to be in the form of an ACC report. Is that basically …
Hird: Was go – was going to be in the form of a big government meeting in Canberra with all the sports related to an ACC investigation”
Essendon AFL Drug Saga 