Former Adelaide Crows player Bryce Gibbs has become the third ex-player to talk about the famous 2018 pre-season camp.
In his recently published autobiography, Eddie Betts provided extraordinary, raw details about his experiences on the field, with former teammate Josh Jenkins later delving into his own adverse experience on the field.
Speaking THEN SAYGibbs became the last to offer his in-depth account.
Full comments by Bryce Gibbs
It started when I arrived at the club, in the trade period, whenever it was in October, November, and they proposed that they were going to this camp in the new year. And I just got to the club and the most important thing for me was to earn the respect of your teammates and build relationships as fast as you can. So I remember sitting in that meeting with some of the more senior players, and the club expressed that the camp would go ahead and there would be a couple of different groups, first, second, third, and we sorted. of had to decide who went to group 1.
For me, it was explained that this would be the most intensive group. And for me, I saw it as an opportunity to accelerate relationships with these guys, these new teammates of mine that I would be playing with going forward, so that’s the way I look at it. I took the opportunity to participate in the more intense group, as I said, to try to accelerate those relationships with these guys.
So from there, a couple of things were a little weird, we were told they wouldn’t tell us any information about what we were going to do. That was part of the program and part of the camp, that’s how they wanted to do it. Basically, you just have to trust us that you’ll be fine. It’s going to be hard, it’s going to be a challenge, but you’re going to be, you’re going to be fine, which I thought was a little unusual, I’m not going to stay there. Still, I kept an open mind and decided to continue in Group 1 as I said for reasons to try for quick relationships with my teammates.
As others have said during the week, I also received a call from a counselor to talk about my childhood and past experiences. I actually thought that was a bit of a red flag as well, from my point of view and during that interview process, I didn’t really reveal too much. I was lucky enough to have a good education, a great childhood, which I am very grateful for. So I didn’t have a lot of trauma, so to speak, growing up, but even then, knowing that, I was still quite calculated in what I said to this person, I didn’t trust them. I didn’t know them. I thought it was unusual to do this until a camp, so I was very calculated in what I said and didn’t really give too much away.
At the top of the field, I remember talking to a lot of the other players about what we could potentially be, and it actually started to cause a little bit of anxiety at times about what’s going to happen, what we’re going to achieve. put through? How hard will it be? I’m just trying to answer these questions. I think that probably built up to camp for some of us. I was still determined to raise my hand and give it a try and see what would come of it.
Obviously from then on we ended up on the Costa Dorada and that’s when things started. Many unusual things began to happen. Much has been said about being rushed down some stairs, onto a bus with tinted windows, we were blindfolded, heavy metal music playing in the background, this guy with a microphone putting the players in, talking about the grand finale, talking about me and leaving my old club, which didn’t affect me too much, because I didn’t have the emotional baggage of the previous year in terms of playing in the grand final and losing it. That had no effect on me, in fact I’ve found it quite funny at times, knowing that they’re trying to screw us over, trying to get under our skin.
It didn’t affect me too much. We weren’t allowed to talk on the bus either and I remember they stopped and did a big scene where someone was talking and they pretended to kick the bus, which was a bit weird. So all these little things that kept happening were strange, but they didn’t think too much of it; on reflection, there were obviously a lot of red flags that were happening as camp progressed.
When we were there, the activity started happening. And a couple of weird rules were put in place like when we were walking from one place to another where we walk in a straight line, we weren’t allowed to talk to each other, we weren’t allowed to shower, they had taken our cell phones, no we were allowed to talk to anybody at home and the guys had kids and that was also a point of contact that, you know, why can’t I call home and check in with my kids at night? So a lot of things happened that were fair, it was hard to justify why we had to do some of those things.
Then we witnessed what would put us through group 1. I think it’s been described as a harness ritual, which I guess you could call it. And he showed us that around a person we didn’t know and it was actually hard to explain what we were witnessing. Like it’s kind of like what’s going on here, that’s weird. I remember looking at a couple of guys and shaking my head and going like what is waiting for us here? What will we get out of this?
But again, I told myself it’s okay, things will be okay. I’m here, I’m going to keep an open mind, and again, I kept coming back to this relationship thing, it’s going to help me build stronger relationships with these guys moving forward.
Once the first guy went, the first player followed that ritual, I think it was then, whether you thought it was right, wrong or indifferent, I think he felt he had to do it. I couldn’t go out now. One person was gone, I had to go through. I spent my time in the harness and experienced what I experienced and it was completely different than what some of the other guys in the harness experienced. And it probably had to do with the fact that I was pretty reserved in that counselor meeting, I didn’t give too much and I probably didn’t get attacked with some of the things that they attacked other guys with.
This made the experience for me probably a little easier in retrospect. But there were definitely people in my face telling me that I left my old club and that I was an ordinary player and whatever, but I could do it, I could overcome it. But watching other players go through what they went through, it was pretty tough. I really didn’t know what to do, I didn’t know how to justify it, what to do about it.
Andrew Hayes: Did you want to stop at any point but felt it wasn’t your place since you were the guy?
BG: I felt we were in a bit of a mood, this whole experience was going on around us and a couple of guys talked about their concerns and there was a bit of negotiation that we would continue what we were doing and order . de I think Eddie used “brainwashing” as he described it, but I don’t know that it’s just the mood of the moment, we just kept doing what they set out to do. And it probably wasn’t until later in reflection that yes, there was probably an opportunity to talk a little bit more.
Obviously in talking and educating ourselves about what to tell family and friends and even the other guys in the other groups, we were told not to go into detail about what happened. For whatever reason, most of us clung to it at the time.
Obviously, the details of what happened have come out during the week, so I don’t really need to repeat anything. But probably the most disappointing thing for me was the post-game in the wash, when we were reflecting on it and the guys started talking and that they had problems with what had happened and talking about their experiences and that it wasn’t great .
This is where when I reflect back I feel like I was really disappointed in myself, because that’s when I started to take a back seat. To see guys stand up and say this is not on, we need to address it, we need to explain to people what happened, they seem to shut down pretty quickly. And for me to see these guys as brave as to go up there and try to have their peace and be locked up – these guys had been at the club for a number of years had a lot of respect within the group. I felt like I had to stand up and say something, how was I going to have a lot of strength or a lot of weight since I had only been there for five minutes?
On reflection, I’m disappointed that I didn’t because there was an opportunity to support some of my peers as they went through a much more difficult emotional experience than I did. So maybe it was easier for me to sit back and say nothing. But reflecting on these comments or ongoing conversations, when we’re trying to clear this up, I regret not speaking up when I probably should have been a more experienced and senior player in this group. And it broke the playing group and the relationships in the football department, the players lost trust with the members of that football department.
We tried to move forward where it was obvious that it was the wrong thing to do. And that’s probably why we’re talking about this four years later and if it had been handled properly and people had taken responsibility and raised their hands and hit him on the head much earlier when it happened, it would still have been difficult and people it still happened what happened and people will still carry some emotional scars but at least they should…