Hird dispels unfounded rumours
James Hird has hit back at "unfounded rumours" suggesting he would be ordered to stand down as Essendon coach this week.
Hird, like his club on Monday night, refuted the suggestion he would stand down as senior coach by Thursday, describing it as untrue.
He said he had grown accustomed to mistruths being told since the investigation into the club's supplement issues began in February.
"I'm not shocked by anything in this investigation or this process. There seems to be a lot of rumour and innuendo that has no fact to it," Hird said on Tuesday morning.
"If you track us through the last six months there's no need to get frustrated … it's been from the Australian Federal Police raiding my house to being sacked.
"There's been a lot ofunfounded rumours that we'll move through."
Essendon had already categorically denied Hird had been ordered to stand down.
The speculation about Hird's future emanated out of Adelaide, where former Crows skipper Mark Ricciuto took to radio station Triple M to report the Bombers coach had been given an ultimatum.
Essendon issued a statement on Monday night to all media describing Ricciuto's reporting as "baseless rumours."
"As a club we are incredibly frustrated by the decision of some sections of the media to report unfounded and untested gossip," the statement read.
Assistant coach Mark Thompson echoed the denial on Fox Footy's AFL 360 program on Monday night.
"He won't stand down - I know that, and he shouldn't," Thompson said.
Thompson called for the whole saga to brought to a conclusion, but predicted that might not be the case.
"We don't want anyone to go through this again. Football's crazy at the moment," he said.
"What's the next three years going to hold? It's going to be in and out of court, it's stakeholders fighting with one another.
"Someone seriously needs to grab this whole situation and position it and get people working together again and respecting one another.
"People are going to just drop off footy if this keeps going.
"If we just drag it through courts the next couple of years, people won't turn up."