Gold Coast coach Damien Hardwick has turned the spotlight back on the AFL amid questions about his club's links to a bookmaker, highlighting the league's own sponsorship with Sportsbet.
Hardwick's pre-match press conference in Darwin reached a flashpoint when he was asked about Suns team manager Mark Opie, who is under investigation by the AFL integrity unit. A Crikey report revealed Opie is a co-founder of registered bookmaker Okebet.
A terse Hardwick insisted Opie would continue in his role and redirected the line of questioning onto the AFL.
"Well, at the end of the day, is it a good look for the AFL to be sponsored by Sportsbet? All these sorts of organisations?" Hardwick said. "You want to start talking about conflict in AFL? I'm just here to talk about footy."
Hardwick's comments come less than a fortnight after Sportsbet cut ties with AFL umpire Nick Foot, who was working for the betting agency's horse-racing coverage. His employment was revealed in the lead-up to Zak Butters' tribunal case for umpire abuse. Sportsbet subsequently confirmed that any current sports officials or administrators would no longer feature in their programming.
Former players and media pundits Luke Hodge and Kane Cornes have also stepped down from the All-Australian panel due to their links with TAB and Sportsbet, respectively.
When asked if it was inappropriate for the club to allow Opie to continue working while under investigation, Hardwick said: "I've answered the question. At the end of the day he's there to perform a role, and he does that role with our football club. Conflicts of interest within AFL circles are prevalent everywhere, as we're seeing at the moment, so that will get dealt with in due course."
As Hardwick batted off one question, journalist Matt Garrick from ABC Darwin fired off another. Hardwick claimed the line of questioning was "tearing everything down."
"I'm here to talk about the game and what it means to the Northern Territory people," Hardwick said. "If you want to take it down that path, talk to the CEO who controls the business aspect of the game. Are we clear? Are we clear? Are we clear? Let's be clear ... We love coming to the Northern Territory, but people like this guy (the journalist) want to sit there and make it everything about everything else. What we're very good at in society at the moment is bringing everything down, tearing everything down."
The Gold Coast Suns are preparing for their Sir Doug Nicholls Round clash against Port Adelaide on Friday.
