I must confess to overlooking an important factor in the Free resignation.
Tony Free was one of the three APPOINTED directors on the board.
As some may be aware, the club has never announced who are the APPOINTED directors.
As I've posted before, I worked out the APPOINTED directors were: O'Neal (2013 and thus up this year), Free (2014) and Dalton (2015).
Now the constitution directly states:
8.1.9 At all times after the 2015 Annual General Meeting, the Board shall consist of six Elected Directors
and three Appointed Directors, but may also include the Executive Director.
The resignation of Free, if activated before nominations were called for, could have resulted in Dunne being granted his spot rather than the retiring Matthies.
Dunne could have taken the Free spot either before or, as is going to happen, after the AGM.
This would have resulted in two spots (Ryan's and a vacant spot from Matthies) being up for election.
Two directors could have been designated APPOINTED directors (O'Neal and Dunne), both announced at the AGM.
I don't know why the board has allowed this messy situation to occur, but it is clear that the unnecessary secrecy around APPOINTED directors has played a part.