Dear members,
Our Board has unanimously endorsed a decision to grow the Essendon Football Club by expanding its facilities with a dual vision for the future.
This vision includes the retention of Windy Hill for club and community outcomes, but also the development of a new, elite, state of the art training and administration facility at a site near Melbourne Airport.
From a football perspective, the new precinct allows for unprecedented future growth and delivers a multi-generational outcome for the club. The land size alone is approximately 100,000 square metres and will allow the club to build one of the largest and most flexible indoor training spaces in the AFL, with elite gym, medical, recovery and IT facilities.
Further to this, to enable the players the best possible training conditions, the club will deliver a two oval football solution, building one ground the size of the MCG, and the other the size of Etihad Stadium. The retention of Windy Hill also provides a third training oval.
This is a bold and strong ambition to help take our great club back to where we belong on top of the ladder. The essence of Essendon can never be contained by a location.
As part of the move, Essendon will form an exciting partnership with the Australian Paralympic Committee, who will base its Victorian Headquarters at the site.
Please be assured, the decision was not taken lightly and was made with careful planning, deliberation and thorough acumen over a long and exhausting process. As a club, we understand the importance of Windy Hill to our history, and as a result have made a commitment to maintaining a significant presence at the ground by opening up the facilities for greater community and local sporting use.
Contrary to what some believe, the decision to move our training and administration base has not been made because of any particular user group at Windy Hill, but in fact with a long term vision in mind. In fact, the Windy Hill precinct is constrained to deliver the professional training outcomes desired by the club, its players and coaches.
With the implementation of a new Football Program to drive and execute this vision, it quickly became clear something needed to be done to give the players a more professional, learning, development and training environment.
The football landscape has never been so competitive, and if we want Essendon to be considered a powerhouse in Australian sport and the AFL, we must not allow our great club to fall behind the rest of the competition, on or off the field.
By embracing a new facility outcome and a sustained presence at Windy Hill, the club is now committed to delivering this dual vision for the future success of Essendon.
No doubt many of you will have a number questions and I promise in time we will endeavour to have them answered as best we can. To start the process, the club will hold a public information forum early next year with details to be finalised shortly.
The club’s ambition is to have landed at Melbourne Airport by the start of the 2013 season.
As a board and administration, our agenda and mandate has always been to act in the best interest of the Essendon Football Club. By expanding our facilities, we have the opportunity to deliver on that promise.
This is a significant and pivotal moment in the history of the Essendon Football Club, and to have James Hird and Mark Thompson support the move and endorse the club’s long term vision for the future is important.
Now, more than ever, I hope you do the same and unite behind the club as we all embark on this exciting journey
David Evans
