'Absolutely buckled': Port Adelaide great fumes over 'botched' trade

Former Port Adelaide player Kane Cornes has lashed the Power administration after the club dealt highly-regarded swingman Dougal Howard to St Kilda.

In exchange for Howard, St Kilda sent picks 12 and 18 to Port Adelaide, as well as some future draft pick swaps.

Veteran ruckman Paddy Ryder was also dealt to the Saints from the Power in exchange for pick 10, a pair of moves widely hailed as some of the savviest transactions in recent history.

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Cornes, a premiership player turned prominent media commentator, was less than impressed with his former club’s deal.

In a series of fiery comments on AFL Trade Radio, Cornes said Port had ‘absolutely buckled’ in their negotiations with the Saints.

“Port Adelaide have completely botched this in my opinion,” he said.

“In this deal, the Saints have absolutely cleaned up. Watch Dougal Howard absolutely bite Port Adelaide here.

“Port Adelaide have been stitched up.”

Howard had reportedly chosen to switch to the Saints, after the Victorian club offered to play him in his preferred position as a key defender, rather than Port Adelaide’s preference to play him in the forward line.

There will be plenty of opportunity for Howard in the St Kilda backline, with veterans Nathan Brown and Jake Carlisle entering the twilight of their respective careers.

Shock new twist in Essendon supplements scandal

The drug administered to Essendon players that led to their suspension in 2016 was only listed as a banned substance several months after the injections were stopped.

A total of 34 Bombers players were banned for 12 months after a Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled the players were injected several times with the banned substance Thymosin Beta-4.

But the drug was only deemed to be logged as prohibitive on February 4, 2013 - months after the club had stopped injecting the players.

The Herald Sun obtained the information under Freedom of Information laws.

"An ASADA official ran a check on the public site for "research" at 10.34am and no flag was generated for Thymosin Beta-4," the newspaper report said.

"Another check on Thymosin Beta-4 just over two hours later at 12.59pm by an ASADA staffer listed it as 'banned in sport'.

"The status update came on the same day AFL boss Andrew Demetriou called Essendon chairman David Evans about a secret investigation into the club's supplements program, prompting the Bombers to 'self-report' to ASADA."

Scientist Bob O'Dea said: "The evidence of a stitch-up is compelling".

The players' defence team did not know the timing of the logging of the ban when they were found guilty in January 2016, the publication added.