Demetriou currently leads a great life - great job, great family, great health etc. If you see what he's done it becomes clear he must be ambitious, and possess a certain amount of drive. But I always had my eye on other things. An incredible human being. Demetriou announced on 3 March 2014 that he would step down from the role as AFL CEO after eleven years, at the conclusion of the 2014 AFL season. At a time when, north of the border, the aftermath of the 1995-97 Super League war was still fracturing relationships in rugby league, "Andrew understood that the key to any successful deal is to create value for all parties," says Brendon Gale. Andrew Demetriou's AFL career was shaped by family and tragedy, Andrew Demetriou will stand down as AFL CEO at the end of 2014 AFL to begin 2-3 month search for a replacement Deputy CEO Gillon McLachlan among leading candidates for top job Demetriou denies AFL could have done more to prevent Essendon supplements crisis. WHEN you are the chief executive of the AFL you carry a big stick and you walk the corridors of power. [21], Demetriou's first wife died in 1999. Folau was paid a reported $3 million for three years; Hunt was persuaded to switch to AFL by Demetriou himself. "I think anyone who has strong views about things and seeks by dint of their own strength of personality to force things through, always runs the risk of alienating people," observes Sydney Swans president Richard Collis. Andrew Demetrious income source is mostly from being a successful Player. Along the way, he also chaired Baxter, a waste management company that was eventually sold to a bigger outfit. Have views on everything. ANDREW DEMETRIOU | CHAIRMAN Former Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Football League (AFL), Andrew has been a CEO across a number of business sectors. Or, as he would put it, giving people options. [9], In the first half of 2005, Demetriou criticised the Sydney Swans and then-coach Paul Roos, labelling the team's play as "unattractive" and "ugly". Part of the secret is planning: he's created a five-person strategy team at the AFL to crunch numbers and model scenarios. ', he would say things like, 'You know, I don't know what the right way to feel is, but at the moment I don't feel comfortable doing that.' "Clearly, we've had great opportunities because of what our parents did for us," says Demetriou. Were working to restore it. McLachlan also played the pivotal role in negotiations which saw the redevelopment of Adelaide Oval as an AFL venue - an achievement which will see the season launched there on Wednesday and which Demetriou described as his greatest professional effort given the degree of difficulty involving the South Australian football body, the cricket association and the state government. Andrew Demetriou at Monday's announcement.Credit:Penny Stephens. In the spirit of reconciliation the AFL acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. Business was booming, but romance, he told friends, was over. And on the drugs policy, the heat was coming in the form of a blowtorch from Howard Government ministers George Brandis and Christopher Pyne, who in the lead-up to the 2007 election beat a path to league headquarters, media in tow, demanding change. The youngest of four boys born to Greek Cypriot parents, Demetriou was good enough to play top-level football in the 1980s, eking out. "Not with four children, no. Demetriou remains a shareholder and board member. He probably should have got into law school, but he missed that. The day of our interview, he leaves work early to go to his four-year-old daughter's birthday party "at one of those Japanese restaurants where they throw things in the air". ("Bizarre, I know," he told one reporter. "Demetriou's values were sewn into his very fabric by his humble upbringing, by the work ethic and sacrifice of parents hell-bent on building a life for their children in a new land. He lives in a $7-million Toorak mansion, has a family house in Cyprus, and holidays at Lake Como in Italy. "It doesn't make this better," he said at the time, "but it has helped me through a very difficult period. He had a brief move to Hawthorn in 1988, but played only three games and kicked one goal. It represents to him what is best about Australia: egalitarianism, acceptance, encouragement of talent. Were working to restore it. That's not to say he's not respected. You've got to invest in the things you care about.". And we adopted an attitude of making the most of every day and every hour. Demetriou, of course, knows this very well. When the AFL season begins on Thursday, it will include a new team, the Gold Coast Suns, and in 2012, the Suns will be joined by the Greater Western Sydney Giants (GWS); then, for the first time in its 115-year history, the VFL/AFL will have 18 teams in its top competition. Andrew Demetriou is the CEO of the AFL Commission (which runs the AFL competition) and, like Lindsay Lohan, he's a consistent performer. Grow your brand authentically by sharing brand content with the internets creators. But I think it was 28." . Chief executive Andrew Demetriou is kissed by his wife Symone as his daughters Francesca and Alexandra look on during an AFL press conference at AFL. He is a member of famous Player with the age 61 years old group. [11] This proved to be the turning point in the Swans' season, as they lost only two further home-and-away games for the season, both by single-figure margins,[12] and eventually won the premiership. "The Demetrious pay a personal trainer to help keep them in shape - "boxing and all that sort of stuff two or three times a week" - but an Achilles injury has hindered Demetriou's recent progress. but that is not to say that he hasn't experienced challenges to get to that point and won't continue to. "Huh? "Andy Demetriou" redirects here. "I try to get out the door of the office by five. Jennifer husband is now married to news anchor Amy Robach and is co-parenting Robach two daughter together. The AFL is debt-free and soon will have "squirrelled away" a $50-million contingency.Overall, the league is unrecognisable as the once-bereft and bankrupt Victorian competition of 1985, the year the 12 original clubs handed control to an independent commission. ANDREW Demetriou leaves the AFL wounded by events in recent years, but they will not define him. "I'm not a reader of books, which is a disgrace when it's all said and done, but I'm a prolific reader of newspapers, back to front," he says. The chief executive of Crown Resorts, Ken Barton, and a non-executive director of the casino group, Andrew Demetriou, . We don't own this game. The commission has not guaranteed McLachlan the job and appointed an executive search team to test the market for Demetrious successor long before he told Fitzpatrick at the 2014 Super Bowl that he would officially resign in early March. "You could see, even at that young age, that he was very erudite, well-read, interested in travel.". He has treated us fairly and with respect and I admire that. In April 2014, it was announced that Gillon McLachlan, Demetriou's then deputy, would be his successor. She died in 1999, aged 47. "Along with my wife, we used to go away as a foursome on holidays," recalls Unglik. "And some day he'll move on. Andrew Demetriou was born, the youngest of four boys, in Melbourne to Greek Cypriot parents in 1961. Fans levelled a lot at Demetriou during his time as chief of the nation's dominant sporting code. Andrew Demetriou, the million-dollar boss of Australia's dominant sports code, joins his fellow board members around the table once a month. It never affected me.". Collect, curate and comment on your files. Demetriou played 103 games for the North Melbourne Football Club between 1981 and 1987, finishing his playing career with a three-game stint for Hawthorn in 1988. "She said to the teacher, 'How's Andrew going? And because of where the new AFL teams are based, who will play in them and how the money will flow, the most serious impacts are almost certain to be felt by AFL's main competitor for fans, players and cash: the National Rugby League. And Britney," Demetriou changes tack. Of course, despite all the tearing of hair and gnashing of teeth, the NRL and the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) have been stealing each other's players for years. As the AFL's most visible symbol, it can also be convenient to hate Andrew Demetriou. She was quite a reserved person. I played golf once three or four years ago, and when I got home after six hours " - he pauses, smiling - "no, no. In the dedication of a final book, she made an unusual reference to her husband. Even if it's 10 o'clock at night he'll still be responding to emails or taking calls. I want to be challenged by that team. Demetriou, a straight talker who supporters and critics alike recognise for his negotiating steel as much as they do for his decisiveness on policy issues, has used his CEO tenure to build on the league's expanding reputation as a force for cultural and social change, championing racial equality, cancer awareness and respect for women while putting player welfare at the forefront of league policies on pay and illicit drug use. Does he ever have time on his own? "We are living in an age of scrutiny that we've never experienced before and it's not just football. "He likes to present himself as not ambitious. As head of the AFL Players' Association, the footballers' union, Demetriou had played hard ball on the way to achieving his coup de grace - the first collective agreement (involving him) for the competition's 600-plus professional players, which gave them a massive pay rise, justly recognising them as the real stars of the show. It's been a real joy to be a part of. But that's part of the game. They'll have a women's round, an indigenous round, a tie-a-ribbon-around-everything round. Demetriou is the youngest son of Greek Cypriot immigrants. "Now he's Mr Opera, Mr Art.". "I'll never forget the phone calls," he says of the jarring interruption of bad news from afar. And it was as AFLPA CEO in 1998 that he secured a historic collective-bargaining agreement that delivered a significant pay rise to the competition's 600-odd players. The new general manager of football operations was stunned, to say the least. just moments after touching on the death of his first wife. He suffered heartbreak a decade ago when his first wife, the academic and historian Jan Bassett, died of cancer, but today Andrew Demetriou's life seems very much on an even keel. They have three daughters and a son. He passes a few remarks about Peter Costello's criticism of Australian Football League players visiting schools, and reflects on the launch of rugby union's new Melbourne team. Bit like Lindsay Lohan.". "But the world needs teeth."). They met for dinner, got talking and soon the Demetrious had taken a one-third interest in the fledgling business. Chief Andrew Demetriou and wife Symone arrive at the David Jones Summer 2006 Collections Launch on August 17, 2006 in Melbourne, Australia. "He's a boy from Cypriot parents who used to muck around in the backblocks of Coburg, and I think he's a very driven man.". So my career was teaching. "It was a case of 'winners are grinners'," she says without a hint of guilt. We spent a hell of a lot of time travelling in the last two or three years, we did some really wonderful things together, and in some ways, she changed quite a bit as a person in that time, too. , interested in travel. `` ) health etc friends, was over Baxter, waste... 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