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Geelong face battle to hold on to star players
By Greg Denham
September 28, 2009 Geelong chief executive Brian Cook's biggest headache on Sunday was not self-inflicted.
Although his celebrations started in the winning rooms after the match with a Crown Lager and finished with a glass of 1996 Grange Hermitage well after 3am, Cook's only premiership hangover hinged on concerns about retaining his core of premiership players.
Most notably the brilliant Gary Ablett is about to enter the final year of a five-year contract, and Joel Selwood also comes out of contract at the end of next year.
At the end of next season the Gold Coast will enter the players' market with an open cheque book and both Ablett and Selwood will be high on their agenda.
"Reality bites, and unfortunately for everyone at the club, if they want to remain together they will have to accept something like 20 per cent less than market value, on average," Cook said.
"To a person, that has happened in the past. It wasn't just the management that said this is it, it was facilitated by the leadership group. The player leadership group has been quite dynamic in trying to keep the same team together."
Cook has a gut feel that none of his club's stars will move for money.
"I'm remaining really positive about it," Cook said.
"I believe Gary and Joel will both stay. They are both fantastic and loyal men, and they are both very Geelong."
Defender Andrew Mackie said on Sunday Geelong's playing group were well aware of the problems facing the club's administration, acknowledging that several players had accepted below-market contracts for the opportunity to be part of a premiership side.
He hopes that will continue.
"I think the last couple of years the boys have been taking pay cuts, but you can't buy premierships," Mackie said.
"To be a part of this is just priceless. I can't talk for everyone, but it is great to be playing in a great side with great players."
Geelong has up to a dozen players out of contract, but of their better performers only ruckman Mark Blake, defender David Wojcinski and Mathew Stokes, who narrowly missed selection for a third straight grand final appearance, are off contract.
"They've had offers on the table for a while, but we stopped negotiating before the finals," Cook said.
"In October we hope we'll come to finalisation on all those three. It's possible they will all stay if they accept the offers, but it's going to be difficult to keep everyone, to be honest."
Cook admitted managing his star-studded playing group's total player payments throughout this year, was tough going.
"I think we're about $500,000 over in injury payments this year," Cook said.
The Cats received special consideration from the AFL because of an unusally large run of injuries.
"We're actually over the salary cap now, but it's because we spent so much money on injuries," Cook said.
"We budgeted on our recent average, which has been about 60 (additional) match payments over the last three years. But we've had about 130 (match payments) this season."
Over the past two years players that have been "squeezed out" due to Geelong's salary cap pressure include Steven King, Charlie Gardiner and Brent Prismall.
"Our aim, however, is to keep the team together, but if not, we hope to minimise our losses," Cook said.
Total player payments per club increase marginally from $7.69 million this year to $7.95m next year, so some Geelong players will have to accept substantial pay cuts or risk being delisted or offered for trade.
Unlike their precarious situation a decade ago when Cook joined an almost insolvent Geelong from the riches of West Coast, the Cats are now financially secure and about to post their ninth straight profit.
That is despite, among other investments, several long and costly projects to transform dilapidated Skilled Stadium into a modern AFL venue. Stages one and two of the ground redevelopment, at a cost of $56 million, are scheduled to be ready to host a game by round four next year, when capacity will increase to 30,000.
Stage three, scheduled for completion by 2012 or 2013 and will increase Skilled Stadium's capacity to 34,000.
After initially budgeting for a profit of $250,000 this year, Cook said the associated benefits of another premiership could lift the figure to close to $1 million.
That's without most of Geelong's AFL premiership purse of $1.1m, which will mostly be absorbed by their players, bonuses to coaching staff and the cost of Sunday's celebration at Kardinia Park.
For the second year in a row Geelong spent an additional $1.4m on their football department, with a special investment in introducing and staffing an academy for their younger players.
Last year they had the league's sixth biggest football department spender, outlaying $15.1m, about $600,000 above the club average.
Under Cook, at the helm of the Eagles in their 1992 and 1994 premiership years, Geelong has made remarkable off-field progress, as turnover improved from $16m to almost $45m this year.
The Cats have lost their chief operating officer Stuart Fox, who crosses to Hawthorn in November, but have retained highly respected general manager of football operations Neil Balme for another two years.
Balme, who had been sounded out for roles at Richmond and Gold Coast, agreed this week to extend his contract. http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,8659,26133623-5018851,00.html 
