That Toby Greene is considering ending his decorated and colourful career away from Greater Western Sydney has placed an uncomfortable spotlight on the AFL’s youngest club, putting the Giants firmly at football’s crossroads.
To put it bluntly, the prospect of the GWS captain preferring a strong Victorian club over the outfit that bears his DNA would be a disaster for the Giants. After dedicating more than 15 years of blood, sweat, and tears to the club, choosing greener pastures for a premiership would be an alarm-bells moment and the continuum of a series of dominoes that began before the season started when the board delayed its decision on the future of chief executive Dave Matthews.
Greene, who turns 33 on the eve of the grand final, has never before let his contract talks move so close to the deadline which sees him an unrestricted free agent. He sounded the alarm last week when he spoke about his desire to move back to Melbourne – at some unspecified point – for family reasons, leaving his future at the Giants uncertain.
Then his favoured successor to the captaincy, Tom Green, chimed in on his now regular SEN radio segment, confirming his serious concerns about his beloved leader. The younger Green added that Toby Greene’s potential exit would underline his lack of belief in the Giants and their quest for a premiership during the time he has left.
Green comes out of contract next year and will be targeted by clubs Australia-wide and specifically Tasmania. His comments increased the decibels and should have resonated at the board table headed up by the club’s relatively new president, Tim Reed, who has made it clear he wants to make changes at the Giants. But his top-order priority should be moving swiftly to secure both Toby Greene and reigning club champion Green.
This, in turn, makes the choice of a replacement for the long-serving chief executive officer Dave Matthews critical. Reed appeared to have decided to appoint a new club boss after 16 years anyway, but Matthews’ decision to take his future into his own hands and pre-empt the board’s decision blindsided the president with its timing over Gather Round. Greene, who is close with Matthews, would now need to be comfortable with the club’s off-field direction before agreeing to commit to the Giants for his playing life.
Greene is the Giants’ games record-holder, historically their best player and their emotional barometer, having transitioned from a prodigiously talented but turbulent youth to an all-Australian captain. He is only three goals away from passing his great mate Jeremy Cameron as the club’s leading goal kicker.
Just as Cameron’s decision to return to Victoria was a powerful sliding-doors moment that potentially cost the Giants a flag, Greene’s departure would create cultural upheaval.
To trace just how GWS – although that moniker looks headed for the scrapheap under Reed – landed at this critical juncture before the mid-season bye can be traced in several directions, but notably to a backroom decision made during the off-season.
Matthews was coming out of contract at the end of 2026. An occasionally divisive figure at AFL headquarters where he had served as an executive under Andrew Demetriou, Matthews had addressed the prospect of extending his lengthy tenure at the club. Reed and his board responded with less than enthusiasm, placing a decision on Matthews’ future on hold.
Matthews had been jettisoned into the role by the AFL in late 2011 as 18-year-old Greene came on board as an inaugural first-round draftee. In their different ways, they went on to create a franchise which very quickly felt like a football club. But also in their different ways, they both fell foul of officialdom.
Greene was suspended for five matches in 2014 by his own leadership group after being charged – though not convicted – for assault outside a licensed venue. He has missed a total of 15 games due to suspension, having attracted 25 charges for on-field incidents.
Matthews rarely baulked from challenging head office, despite the reality that his club remained financially reliant on the AFL. League bosses – specifically Gillon McLachlan and Richard Goyder – bristled over the years at his willingness to take them on; fighting for his club over incidents ranging from the Lachie Whitfield avoidance of a possible drug test to the AFL penalties handed down over a regrettable post-season player celebration, which became known as “Whacky Wednesday”.
His club failed to land Lance Franklin, yet was punished when the commission removed the cost-of-living allowance from both Sydney clubs. Head office, in turn, briefed the media on Matthews’ perceived shortcomings, ranging from his struggle to make a significant imprint in the western Sydney market and the Giants’ empty seats on match days to his work habits.
Matthews, in turn, rightly took on head office, in tandem with the Swans, over the AFL’s blindness to the challenges facing the game in Sydney and refusal to adequately spend, staff and promote the cause.
This is not to suggest that Reed and his board didn’t reach an independent decision by not immediately committing to Matthews for another term. However, there is no doubt that McLachlan’s and Goyder’s doubts about Matthews reached Reed. Interestingly, the new regime moved to defend Matthews after the commission agreed earlier this year that development and promotional failures in the club’s non-football heartland were the responsibility of the AFL’s own, significantly better-resourced team, or perhaps even more so.
Still, the board would not commit to its CEO, who wisely jumped early, and is now, with his legacy secured, working to help anoint his successor.
Matthews, too, bears the club’s DNA. The prospect of a GWS within two seasons without Matthews, Toby Greene and Tom Green looms as unrecognisable, and not in a good way.
The outgoing CEO realises that retaining Toby Greene remains crucial to his legacy. Unless Greene is playing a very clever game, he now seems genuinely torn, which has clearly proven a matter of deep concern to his teammates, specifically captain-in-waiting Tom Green.
It was reported in April, after Matthews resigned, that he would move to a consultancy role with head office, potentially guaranteed a part-time advisory role with him remaining in Sydney, but the AFL moved swiftly to deny those reports. But Matthews will leave the club having overseen eight finals appearances over the past decade, including four preliminary finals and a grand final. This compares with just one finals appearance by the Gold Coast, which predated GWS’s entry to the league by one year.
Not every football appointment he oversaw made its mark, but the Giants remain respected across the competition as a formidable and stable football club.
The contenders for the Giants’ top job range from former politicians and media bosses to Sydney-based corporates, but the frontrunner remains former GWS executive James Avery, who now runs Stadiums Tasmania. The interview process will start within weeks.
Paul Guerra’s recent and brutal departure as CEO at Melbourne suggests that Avery, with strong administrative credentials in football and a solid relationship with the AFL, will be hard to beat.
But the question marks over Greene and Green – two players who understand the backroom machinations of the game as well as being brilliant on the main arena – should concentrate the board’s efforts to move decisively. To make the forthcoming negotiations even tougher, the Giants will, at the very least, struggle with salary cap constraints and the lingering challenges presented by existing long-term deals for several players, notably Josh Kelly and Stephen Coniglio.
Greene has been frustrated with his own form of late, struggling with a damaged toe and charged with leading a team decimated by injury. This series of unfortunate events began on Friday, February 13 when Tom Green suffered a season-ending knee injury and Toby Bedford pulled a hamstring. And then Sam Taylor was injured in the State of Origin game.
The Giants’ line-up has been inconsistent due to injuries, and last Sunday’s loss to West Coast and his own form clearly shattered Greene.
To echo Tom Green, if Greene loses faith, his departure would flatten the entire club, not only due to his absence, but also because he no longer believes in the quest. The past three seasons of shattering finals-ending losses under Adam Kingsley, the coach who made him outright captain, have cut successively deeper.
He was offered a two-year deal at the end of last season, but his manager Paul Connors told GWS footy boss Jason McCartney that they would talk again early in season 26. Connors managed McCartney in his playing days, and both seemed relatively relaxed at the time. They met again two games into the season in March when Greene’s camp asked for a three-year commitment. The Giants agreed and a revised contract was put forward. Still, the commitment has not been matched, and the club believes Hawthorn has made a strong pitch to the ageing champion, with Geelong also in the frame.
This comes at a time when Greene and wife Georgia Stirton have spoken about extending their brood, missing hands-on help from extended family, and ultimately setting their sights upon their hometown.
It is all very well to point to Greene’s strong relationship and belief in Adam Kingsley and his bond with his teammates, as well as his determination to be part of an historic premiership. But his harbouring of doubts is a problem. Dispelling those doubts remains the mission of every Giants leader, and the onus is now on Reed’s board to act swiftly to create a clear vision of what the Giants will look like without Matthews.
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