Steak with Scott, Japanese with Mitchell: Inside Merrett’s bid to defect to Hawthorn

When Hawthorn had their line in the sand moment, it was on the MCG. Essendon were the bullies the Hawks stood up to, and blood was spilt.

When Essendon had their line in the sand moment, it was in the boardroom. Hawthorn were doing the bullying, and it was bloodless.

Zach Merrett was in a deep funk after another deja vu season of disappointment at Essendon when he decided he needed to get out. He did not start with the plan to go to his club’s most-loathed rival and invite himself over to their coach’s house for dinner.

Merrett’s manager at the time, Tom Petroro, was well aware of his client’s long frustration at the pace of change at Essendon and his restlessness to move, but warned him that wanting to move and being able to move when you are the captain – especially of Essendon in the situation they were in – and under contract were two very different things. Even asking the question would cause blowback.

Essendon’s then-president David Barham with Zach Merrett at the Brownlow Medal last year.Credit: AFL Photos

At season’s end, Merrett and his wife Alexandra, along with Petroro, went to Brad Scott’s house for dinner. With then-club CEO Craig Vozzo also present, over barbecued steak and a Barossa red Merrett spoke of his sense that time was running out on his Essendon career to achieve success. He expressed his frustration but did not explicitly ask for a trade. Alexandra spoke at length of her concern at the toll football and leadership at Essendon was taking on her husband.

They all sympathised. Vozzo and Scott ended the night feeling the pressure valve had been released for their captain. Vozzo and Scott also felt that, while Merrett was contracted for two more years, football inflation meant their best player was now relatively underpaid, and they should look to fix that.

It would take more than a dinner for Merrett to unburden himself. He liked Scott and the way he coached. He liked Vozzo, too, and he could see the path they were taking the club down, but he feared that, like Dyson Heppell before him, he would run out of tarmac before the Bombers took off.

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He’d had enough. While he had floated the idea of getting out before, this time was different. This time he met again with Petroro and told him he wanted a trade. He was told it was going to be very difficult, but they could explore how it might happen and draw up a shortlist.

Merrett wanted to stay in Melbourne and go to a club in contention. He settled on three options: Collingwood, who had pursued him before he signed his last contract; the Western Bulldogs; and Hawthorn.

The Magpies considered it for about a week but without a pick in the first round of last year’s draft as a starting point for a trade, concluded it would be too hard, and ruled themselves out. The Bulldogs were also interested but, like Collingwood, figured Essendon would command more than they would be willing or able to give up.

The Hawks thought about it and said, “We are in”, believing they could construct a deal to make it work. They would have a couple of first-round draft picks given James Worpel was going out as a free agent to Geelong, and they would get a compensation pick for him, and they could trade picks two years into the future.

Within days of dining with his own coach, Merrett was at the table of another. Over Japanese takeaway and a couple of beers, Sam Mitchell, Hawthorn footy boss Rob McCartney and Jarryd Roughead, who worked in list management at Hawthorn, put the case to move to Merrett and Alexandra. Merrett didn’t need any selling on the idea.

Barely 12 hours after the dinner, journalist Tom Morris (then with Nine, owner of this masthead) broke the story that Merrett had dined at Mitchell’s house and wanted a trade to the Hawks.

Essendon were unimpressed. They rang Petroro wanting to know if the story was true. It was.

The Essendon board met soon after the captain’s meeting, and the prospect of Merrett asking for a trade was raised. Andrew Welsh was vice president then, but also the football director so he took the lead in the conversation. It didn’t last long.

Senior coach Sam Mitchell was heavily involved in the attempt to poach Merrett while under contract.Credit: AFL Photos

“It was unanimous that we were not going to trade him,” then-president David Barham recalled.

“You have to stand for something, and he was our best player, our captain, and he was contracted. I knew I was finishing up but ‘Welshy’ was strongly of the same view that we’re not doing it. Why would we trade our best player and captain, so we can watch them win the flag this year with him winning the Brownlow?”

Essendon leaders Nic Martin and Mason Redman spoke publicly of their disappointment at their captain meeting with another club’s coach and wanting out of the club.

Essendon’s line in the sand

Welsh was on the MCG when Hawthorn physically took the fight back to his club in 2004.

He understood from bloody personal experience that day that although Essendon won the game easily on the scoreboard, the loss became a defining moment in Hawthorn’s modern history. They had learnt you can lose without being defeated, and that you gain more respect when you act with self-respect.

Welsh was named Essendon president soon after Barham stood down. Welsh’s first comments as president were unequivocal: under no circumstances would the club trade Merrett.

That position would have held, no matter what team Merrett wanted to join, but the fact that it was Hawthorn, the club Essendon liked as much as root canal surgery, made the decision easier and their resolve stronger.

Merrett had not actually asked for a trade yet, and in fact didn’t do so until trade period was well underway, but it was clear from the moment of Welsh’s comments that any possible deal was as good as dead in the water.

Privately, some senior people at the Bombers wondered if the situation, despite being messy, was not still fixable. Merrett had two years to run on a five-year contract that averaged out at $900,000 a year. He had already been front-ended a million dollars of that contract, meaning he was left to be playing on $650,000 in 2026 and 2027.

Hawthorn’s offer, Essendon believed, was worth roughly $6 million over five years.

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Essendon people were less concerned by the fact the contract had been front-ended than by the fact that even at $900,000 a year, Merrett was now on “unders” for a club’s best player, let alone captain.

From the very first conversation Merrett had with Scott and Vozzo at the barbie at Scott’s house, and then again during the trade period, he was told there was more money available and asked whether that would help change his mind. Merrett repeatedly said no, it was not about the money.

The failed trade

Days of the trade period passed without a word about Merrett between the two clubs. When finally negotiations opened they did so by email. It came on the Monday afternoon ahead of the Wednesday trade deadline, when the Hawks sent an offer they said would lapse within a few hours if not accepted. There would be no guarantee the same terms would be available afterwards.

Essendon replied quickly: No.

Meanwhile, stories were regularly dribbling out about the degree of angst Merrett felt towards the Bombers and his frustration that they were blocking his move. It fed a narrative that things were becoming untenable for Merrett to return. Scott, though, kept in regular contact with him.

Andrew Welsh was a tough defender in his playing days. As Dons president he ruled out trading Merrett.Credit: Paul Rovere

Meanwhile, Merrett watched in bewilderment and frustration as contracted stars Christian Petracca, Clayton Oliver and Charlie Curnow asked for trades and appeared to be getting what they wanted with little rancour. Yet, he was seen as a villain.

The trade talks went everywhere and nowhere. Any suitable Hawthorn players that could be tied into a deal could not be agreed on. Essendon said the only way they could shift their position would be with an offer so big it was ridiculous. Hawthorn had no interest in a ridiculous offer.

Essendon eventually said the only offer that would turn their heads had to involve four first-round draft picks. Hawthorn came up with three first-rounders, albeit one of them would be late in the first round and another would be in the draft that will be compromised by the new Tasmania team. Hawthorn went as far as they could, but this was a bridge too far.

That eventual Essendon demand was put to Petroro, who communicated it to Hawthorn in a rant captured on the TV cameras inside the trade room. He was seen pointing his finger at the Hawthorn football group. It was assumed he was threatening them but those in the room said he was venting his anger at Essendon, not Hawthorn.

Vision emerged of an animated Tom Petroro on the final day of the trade period when Essendon shut the door on Hawthorn’s attempts to land Merrett.Credit: afl.com.au

The trade window closed. No deal done.

Frustrated and upset, Merrett fired off a text to a senior Essendon person, unsparing in his thoughts on the failed trade.

“Tom [Petroro] is such a passionate and loyal guy – he was fighting tooth and nail to get the job done, and I was just sitting at home with my wife and my cousin watching the Petracca deal happen, and then the Curnow deal, and it looked like it was going to happen – and it didn’t,” Merrett said on Fox Footy this week.

“That’s a stance they’ve made now: he is our best player. We are not giving him to the team we hate. Why would we help them win a premiership?”

“The clock ticked over 6.30, and then pretty quickly trying to wrap your head around you’re going back, and what that may look like.”

Two days later, Merrett was at his grandmother’s funeral and soon after that he was back at training at the Hangar. A dinner was held with team leaders to discuss his failed move and to clear the air.

“There was a lot of emotion flowing [but] not anger — I signed that deal four years prior. They committed to me massively, so there was no anger around the decision-making to hold me to the contract,” he said.

Not just any other club

Jason Dunstall lived the Hawthorn rivalry. While personally not a character who needed to be emotionally charged to perform, he was schooled in the unique antipathy to Essendon the day he walked in the door at Hawthorn. He recognised the extra bite the rivalry gave the Merrett talks. While the non-trade created another instalment in the clubs’ rivalry, in truth it was more pragmatic than emotional.

“I get amused by all the Zach Merrett stuff. He would have been a great pick-up, but the moment you get a new president who comes into a club and says, ‘We are not trading him under any circumstances’, it doesn’t matter what deal you offer you, can’t get a deal done because he can’t backtrack on that,” Dunstall said.

“Then everyone is talking about, ‘You promised a deal, and you didn’t do it.’ Well, you couldn’t get a deal done once a president sticks his stake in the sand and says, ‘That’s it, he is not getting traded’. So we didn’t get a great player we would have loved to have had, that just means the pressure is on others to fill that void.”

On Friday night Essendon play Hawthorn at the MCG. Merrett has handed the captaincy to Andy McGrath.

Zach Merrett handed over the Essendon captaincy following his failed attempt to be traded to Hawthorn.Credit: Essendon FC

“It will be an interesting game, the fans will respond. It will be interesting to see how they view Zach in that first game as well. But whenever you see an Essendon-Hawthorn game, there is always a bit of spice in it, and it is fun to watch,” Dunstall said.

Four-time premiership champion Luke Hodge was also on the ground when the Hawks drew their line in the sand. He doubts any offer would have satisfied the Bombers.

“Generally if you walk into a trade period a with a 30-year-old bloke and someone’s offered three first-round picks you should snap that up every day,” Hodge said.

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“[But] if Hawthorn went in and offered them four first-round picks, they would have wanted five. If they offered them five they would have wanted six. I think that was the mindset. I think with ‘Welshy’ coming in, it was almost at the stage Hawthorn were at in ’05, where they are sick of getting pushed around. It shows that this football club has been pushed around for way too long.

“When you had [Dean] Solomon come on the board and Welsh come in they were making a stand saying, ‘We’re going to go back to the football club that we have been in the past.’

“That’s a stance that they’ve made now: he is our best player. We are not giving him to the team that we hate. Why would we help them win a premiership?

“I think both clubs made the right call. Essendon wanted to get maximum and that was still not going to be enough and Hawthorn didn’t want to give away the future.”

Part one: ‘You’re Essendon scum’: Inside the origins of footy’s most intense hatred

Part two: Snipers and lines in the sand: How Lloyd’s bone-crunching bump got the wrong man

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