Former North Melbourne player and current Adelaide SANFL footballer Blake Drury was secretly suspended by the Crows over sexist comments at a promotional shoot.
Drury, who played 10 games for the Kangaroos across 2023 and 2024 before being delisted, along with Central District vice-captain Aiden Grace, were both banned from representing South Australia in a recent state league game against Western Australia.
It has been reported that the two, while filming promotional material for the state game, were found to have been making inappropriate comments about a female staff member during a break in recording.
The comments were picked up by a microphone and discovered by the staff member herself.
The SANFL chose to deal with the matter by privately suspending Drury and Grace for the match, with the pair sending written apologies to the staff member and required to undergo respectful relationships education.
“Adelaide Football Club can confirm one of its SANFL-listed players was sanctioned for making inappropriate comments about a SANFL staff member,” the Crows said in a statement regarding Drury’s conduct.
“The club is extremely disappointed and angered by the incident, and it endorsed the SANFL’s sanction.”
In a statement, the SANFL said they were ‘extremely disappointed’ with the ‘unacceptable conduct’.
Drury nominated for the AFL’s mid-season rookie draft on Wednesday night in a bid to return to the highest level, but was overlooked.
The incident comes just days after news broke of an unnamed Adelaide AFL player having faced a police investigation over allegations he shared a photo of a woman without her consent to a former teammate.
Blow for Seven as Kayo smashes records
Fox Footy are proclaiming record viewership numbers in the first season of their move to providing their own broadcast for every AFL match, in a blow for free-to-air broadcaster Seven.
According to the network, streaming service Kayo Sports has had a 25 per cent increase from 2024.
Notably, that increase has primarily come from a major spike in viewers on Thursday and Friday nights, which are up by 41 per cent and 30 per cent respectively.
In past seasons, Fox Footy have owned the rights to broadcast all AFL games, but have chosen to simulcast all games also shown by Seven and use their commentary feed.
However, that changed to start 2025, with the network boosting their stable of commentators to compete directly with Seven.
On Thursday nights, Mark Howard and Matt Hill now call games, while Friday nights – and marquee matches – are covered by Anthony Hudson and Gerard Whateley, the latter of whom has made his television commentary debut this year after decades as a doyen of radio commentary for the ABC and SEN.
The Thursday night Kayo increase has also coincided with polarising commentator Brian Taylor’s move from Friday to Thursday nights on Seven.
Taylor has been a notable critic of Fox Footy’s coverage, making headlines by slamming Fox for calling last weekend’s Melbourne versus Sydney match at the MCG from their studio rather than live at the ground.
Speaking to the Herald Sun, Fox Sports executive director Steve Crawley said the network had ‘decided that we’re not going to go down that path’ of criticising Taylor back.
Taylor has served as Seven’s main commentator, including for the grand final, since the retirement of Bruce McAvaney at the end of 2020, having joined the network in 2012.
However, he has long proved a divisive caller among fans, with frequent criticism of his bombastic commentary style and tendency to get players’ names wrong.
Divisive pundit and former great Kane Cornes has also been put on the struggling Thursday night slot, having been recruited from rival network Nine in the off-season.
However, it seems a string of controversies, including a stoush with North Melbourne where he was barred from the club rooms pre-match following lengthy criticism of the club and coach Alastair Clarkson, and a pre-game run-in with Western Bulldogs coach Luke Beveridge before their loss to Geelong last week, haven’t brought Seven the ratings spike they were after.
Hawks legend’s stepson joins Dons in mid-season draft
Essendon have picked two towering talls in a bid for a mid-season draft cure to their injury woes.
The injury-hit Bombers were the busiest club with four selections at Wednesday night’s mid-season rookie draft.
While 10 clubs with no vacant list spot didn’t have a pick, the Bombers went hard to address a concerning injury list featuring 10 players who are 190cm or taller.
Essendon picked Archie May, a 198cm-tall forward from WAFL club Subiaco, with its first selection and pick six overall.
May is the stepson of AFL and Hawthorn legend Dermott Brereton, a known antagonist of the Bombers during the 1980s, when the two clubs were the biggest rivals in the game.
Collingwood were known to be heavily interested in May, but didn’t have a pick before the Bombers swooped.
The Bombers followed by taking 203cm ruckman Lachlan Blakiston from East Fremantle (pick 13).
Essendon then promoted small goalsneak Oscar Smart from their VFL outfit and plucked forward Liam McMahon, who was Carlton’s VFL captain.
West Coast, with the first pick of the draft, signed Tom McCarthy from Richmond’s VFL ranks.
Just two years ago, the 24-year-old was playing division two amateurs in Victoria’s Southern League.
“I’ve definitely come from kind of nowhere,” McCarthy said.
“”I feel so privileged that I’ll get to live my dream … I’m super pumped to get started.”
North Melbourne used pick two on Werribee small forward Zac Banch, who in round six equalled the all-time VFL record for score assists with eight.
“He gets up the ground and then he’s a bit of a handful when he’s streaming back to goal,” North’s recruiting manager Will Thursfield said.
“He’s very clean, he’s very crafty, he doesn’t need much time to make his decisions and he’s a very nice kick of the footy.”
Port selected towering 202cm defender Harrison Ramm from reigning SANFL premiers Glenelg at pick four.
Another Werribee product, Flynn Young, was taken by Carlton at pick five and Glenelg lost another key backman when Oscar Allen, who has previously been on St Kilda’s list, joined Gold Coast at pick seven.
Collingwood chose utility Roan Steele from West Perth, while West Coast added SANFL outfit Norwood’s Jacob Newton with pick nine.
The Kangaroos signed Cooper Trembath from their VFL ranks to round out the top 10, as 18 players were selected overall.
Experienced AFL duo Adam Tomlinson and Brandon Parfitt were overlooked.
(with AAP)
