General manager of football Peter Bell spoke to Sam McClure and Nick Dal Santo on NAB Trade Radio on Tuesday morning.

Here are the key takeaways from the interview. 

On Justin Longmuir’s hiring as senior coach
It was a terrific day for the football club yesterday and a terrific day for Justin Longmuir and his family. We conducted a comprehensive process…in the end it was Justin, whose ability to articulate his vision for the football club, his game style and very much his emphasis on building relationships within the club that saw him get the nod. It was a nice touch also, but not an influential part of the decision, that he has previously played for Fremantle.

On Bradley Hill’s trade request to St Kilda
When all is said and done, he is a Fremantle contracted player so the onus is really on St Kilda and it’s incumbent on them to demonstrate to us a deal that will be satisfactory for us.

On the importance of Bradley Hill to Fremantle
Bradley’s been an exceptional player with the club and a very popular member of our club as well.
I think the whole industry has recognised the high level of his play this year and in a really difficult position on the wing. He’s got some rare athletic attributes. His ability to run hard at pace is unparalleled in my opinion in the AFL so he’s a player we love.

 

On what would be an appropriate trade for Hill
I probably won’t go into the details…clearly we value him a lot, there’s numbers that are being discussed in the media space as far as tenure of contract and quantum of dollars. If those details are anywhere near correct, then clearly St Kilda value him very highly as well. We would think that some of their offers back to us would be reflective of the numbers that are out there.

On the potential return of Tim Kelly to WA
I think the Geelong best and fairest is Thursday night. We think Tim will feature prominently as he did last year. Soon after that, I’d imaging Tim would give some indication whether he wants to remain at Geelong, where he’s had such a profound impact in a short career so far, or if he wants to return home to Western Australia. Whether he indicates that is West Coast, as he did last year, or if it’s just Western Australia, we’ll have to wait and see.

On securing Kelly, should he request a trade to WA
It’s up to us to go in there and pitch as hard as we can. It’s very complicated isn’t it? As Geelong have invested a lot into Tim and the family. Clearly we like him, we’ll be doing everything we can. Some say that potentially, we have some more collateral than what West Coast have but West Coast are a fantastic club and I’m sure that they are doing everything they can to satisfy Geelong, if Tim indicates that he wants to go there. 

On uncontracted midfielder Ed Langdon
We put an offer to Ed early in the year, which he and his management sat on for quite some time, which is absolutely their prerogative. Ed’s is a different situation in that he’s uncontracted at the club. Ed’s been a wonderful player, a terrific character but we’ve been aware that potentially there are some strong family pulls for Ed to get back to Victoria.
There’s been some indications that indeed he does want to return to Victoria but we haven’t really had a formal notification…until that actually happens, we can’t progress with any negotiations, if that is indeed where it goes.