I reckon if you ■■■■ off your coach and he doesn’t drop you, that’s bad for the club.
As it stands, if Derek is to be believed, he ■■■■■■ off the coach and then stank it up for two weeks before being dropped. That seems more than a fair go.
End of the day, any player you could think of that took his spot in the GF was worth more to the team than him.
Off you ■■■■, Derek.
I’m not going to dump on Kickett. He was a fair part of the reason we got to play finals that year. But he stunk it up when the pointy end arrived, and was dropped from the GF team. Not the best for him, but definitely best for the team. That’s life, move on.
Farken sook. Didn’t deserve a spot in the GF and Sheeds was proved correct with his decision.
Kickett played in two other grannies which is more than most get to play in. He was ok in 90 but was putrid in the 96 GF
Sheedy was right to drop Kickett. As you say, his finals form had been dismal. And Chris Daniher was a good player – not the best of the Danihers, but a straight ahead, get the ball and kick it player who got quite a lot of the ball and usually used it pretty well.
As for Wallis, we won a lot of games when he was in the team. And he ended with two premiership medals.
Didn’t think Sheeds would just let this go through to the keeper. 
LEGENDARY Essendon coach Kevin Sheedy has dismissed accusations he had a “personal vendetta” against Derek Kickett, insisting the mercurial star wouldn’t have even been his next selection to play in the 1993 Grand Final.
Kickett was controversially dumped from the side, despite playing every other game and kicking 38 goals that season, sparking a rift between the two which has lasted almost 25 years.
Their feud was reignited on Seven’s The Front Bar last night when Kickett launched a scathing attack on Sheedy, saying his axing was personal, not form-related.
Sheedy was initially reluctant to reopen old wounds today, but told the Herald Sun Kickett’s form was the main reason, saying he would have chosen two other Bombers ahead of him if forced to make further changes.
He also revealed Carlton’s tall forward line meant the Bombers had to look at taking in an extra tall defensive back-up, in Dean Wallis.
“Everyone knows I love Derek Kickett … I still love him, but I don’t apologise for winning the premiership by (almost) eight goals,” Sheedy said.
“On form, he didn’t deserve to be in the team. (The other two emergencies) Michael Symons and David Flood were the next two I would have selected.
“It was more about tactics than a personal vendetta. I needed some height in defence … I had the shortest centre half back in a premiership side in Mark Harvey, and I had an 18-year-old schoolboy as my fullback.
“I had to bring in (Dean) Wallis because of Carlton’s tall forwards, and Tim Watson even went to fullback at one stage of the game.”
After kicking eight goals in the Round 20 game against the Bulldogs, Kickett kicked only one goal in his next four games.
Kickett’s bitterness stems from the fact that the bad news came from football manager Danny Corcoran, not the coach.
“In all my footy career, I’ve never rang the team manager and said ‘am I in the footy team?’,” Kickett said.
“That week of the grand final I rang Danny Corcoran and I said ‘am I in the footy team?’ and he said ‘no’.
“Because I knew, I had a feeling that I was going to get dropped.
“That’s because Sheeds had some personal vendetta against me and it wasn’t about my injury or whatever my performance was, it was a personal vendetta, because we had a few words about three or four weeks before the Grand Final.”
Sheedy said Corcoran relayed the news before he had time to contact his player, by which stage an angry Kickett had already “skipped town.”
Kickett said he had tried to make contact with Sheedy a number of times in the years since, but his advances had been unsuccessful.
“I’ve rang him a few times and I’ve got my associate here in Melbourne to ring him a few times and spoken to him a few times and he said he doesn’t want to speak to me,” Kickett said.
“So whatever reason he’s got, maybe he’s hiding something that I don’t know that the public should know?”
But, in a column for the Herald Sun in 2008, Sheedy wrote he had reached out to Kickett.
“I’ve asked Derek on three occasions whether he wanted to speak about the issue and each time he’s said: ‘I’m not ready.’,” Sheedy wrote.
“He may never be ready, but at least I’m asking, because I think it’s time.
“I’ll never be awful to him. I don’t believe you have to play all of the footballers who have played in every match if that’s not right for that team.
“Derek Kickett got dropped. It was bad luck”
Kickett never played another game for the Bombers, and ended up finishing his 152-game career with Sydney.
My memory is vague too, I thought that Kickett was successful as an impact player off the bench late in the season, and my impression is that Sheedy played him out of form by not giving him enough match time. Back then there weren’t many rotations.
Hmmm…just the weekly stick the the boots into Essendon story.
slagged us in the media, 10 goal win coming up.
“I played really well just over a month ago” is proof that Essington has always been with us even when we were good.
Assuming he played in 93 - would we have still won? I reckon yes.
I wonder what his impact would have been in 95 or 96? Enough to get us past Richmond or Sydney?
Watson kicked the 1st and last goal for us in the Prelim. That and the fact he is Tim Watson more than warranted him playing.
Spot on. I thought the same, and can remember at the time being annoyed the weeks before the GF he was bench warming too much and didn’t believe that he was getting a fair go. Thought that he must have been going outside team rules or something.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought it was a 2 man bench then. Kickett was a skilful burst player, but erratic , not much of a team player and did not work to improve his endurance skills. As for Chris Daniher, he was steady, like his brothers had the work ethic, played out a full game and had few turnovers.
interestingly didn’t Wallis spend most of his gametime up forward ?
Who knows if true, I wouldn’t put it past sheedy, at the time to be vindictive if indeed kickett had ■■■■■■ him off a few weeks before, or played him sparingly til he was out of form.
Somewhere along the lines however somoene is telling porkies, cos i’m sure sheedy had said awhile back he’s tried a few times to contact kickett a few times to settle the bad blood and he claimed kickett wanted nothing to do with him.
now kickett is saying the same thing but in reverse.
DK is a liar.
Are you on repeat or something?
Yeah DJR Kickett did not play well in the finals leading him the GF, Sheeds says though it was his worst decision to not play Kickett.
He was getting a bit overweight.
Considering we were down and nearly out against the Crows the week before and picked our azses up off the deck…was Kickett instrumental in that comeback, not really.
wrong thread