Footy is pantomime, and part of the conceit is that the players care about the club as much as the fans do. Doubtless in some cases that is true - think guys Shaunny Mac, Pav and Sandi - but many players are just passing through. I'd always hoped Neale would be a one-club Freo player, but it turns out he was just one of the blokes passing through. It's a bit sad.
As someone who lives in the real world, and who likes to change jobs every few years to keep things interesting, I don't begrudge players leaving. But in the pantomime world of footy I've constructed a hierarchy of acceptable reasons to leave a club. Top of the list is heading home to be with family (especially if you have young kids). Bottom of the list is a cash grab.
Neale might have lots of reasons for leaving, and like many things on here it has become a Rorschach test of how you feel about the club. For example, if you are inclined to dislike Lyon, then you'll see Lachie leaving as a symptom of Lyon's tactics. That seems far-fetched to me. I don't know what's going behind the scenes, but Neale is leaving Freo, not to go home, not to reduce travel, not to a better team, not to a bigger club, but to get a lot more money. If he thinks Freo is heading in the wrong direction, then he's decided to hop on a plane with suitcase of cash rather than stick around for the hard graft of turning things around.
Good luck to him. It's his life, his career, and he needs to do what's best for him. Real world Morgan wishes him well and thanks him for his time at Freo.
Freo fan Morgan will henceforth refer to him as a mercenary hobbit, and remember him as a guy who racked up big stats on a bad team, but didn't have the character to stick around. Freo fan Morgan hopes Brisbane never emerge from their decade long irrelevancy, and Lachie toils away in front of 15,000 bored fans who don't understand the rules for the rest of his career. Neale will never be a life member at an AFL club, and if he never wins a premiership will be nothing a but a footnote in footy's history, He's lost the chance to be a Freo legend, but perhaps that doesn't mean much to him.
Which is a shame.
Now Rosich, you hubristic knob, squeeze Brisbane for everything they are worth, even if it means threatening to sit Neale out for a year. This isn't one of those top-of-the-heirachy reasons for leaving situations, or about a duty of care or club responsibility. This is a player, under contract, taking a transactional approach to footy. He's treated this like a business, and so has Brisbane. The gloves come off on this one.
