East Fremantle Sharks won’t return to home ground by June 29 target
The Sharks remain confident they will return to their home ground before the end of the 2024 season, but their bid to make it back has taken yet another hit.
East Fremantle will not meet its stated target of returning to its home ground on June 29 after aborting a scheduled inspection of the ground on Monday because the playing surface was not ready.
The Sharks remain adamant they will play at the ground before the end of the 2024 season, now setting their sights on a July 13 return against Peel Thunder.
An inspection to confirm the surface suitable for that date will take place within the next two weeks.
In a club statement the Sharks informed members that the return to what will be called East Fremantle Community Park will be delayed for at least a fortnight.
“Late on Friday afternoon the Town of East Fremantle advised us that while progress has been made in recent weeks the playing surface remains narrowly short of the threshold required to receive approval from the West Australian Football Commission,” the statement said.
“Like you, we remain frustrated and disappointed. However we will not compromise on player safety or the long term sustainability of the oval.”
“We remain optimistic that we will be playing football on the oval in 2024, with testing to take place in late June ahead of a tentative return date to Shark Park of July 13.”
The statement said the Sharks were looking for an alternate venue for the June 29 game against Claremont which had been fixtured as an East Fremantle home game.
While Sharks officials insisted they were optimistic about the surface being ready for July 13 the ongoing delays have fuelled concerns that East Fremantle will not be able to return to the ground this year - and concerns off the back of that that the club will face another heavy financial loss for the 2024 season.
Club CEO Addy Wetzler said the state of the surface had been “progressing really well” in recent weeks since logistics company Programmed assumed control of the turf preparation.
“They believe it will be in a position to be tested and have every possible chance to pass the test in late June to allow us to play there on July 13,” he said.
“Obviously nothing is a given, we are frustrated that there is a further delay but we believe that it is getting ever closer.”
Asked why the testing scheduled for Monday had been aborted Wetzler said: “It was determined that it wouldn’t quite pass the threshold in terms of the grass coverage.”
Cam Sutherland (from Programmed) is a very experienced curator and he has had six weeks or so now running the program on the oval.”
“He doesn’t want it to be tested and not pass. He is working towards ensuring that when it is tested it does pass.”
Wetzler said the upside of the delay on getting back to the ground was that it had given the club and the East Fremantle Council to work through user agreements on the ground to make sure that the interests of East Fremantle members would be protected.
“We believe we are very close to finalising the agreements with council. It has been a comprehensive and thorough process and one of the good things about the oval delay is that it has given us a chance to work through those conversations with council and that we are doing the right thing by our members and fans.”
The further delay will raise further concerns on the club’s long term financial position after it lost almost $140,000 in 2023 despite winning a premiership while being stranded without a home ground.
Asked if the club could absorb another loss like that Wetzler told Code Sports at the end of May: “We are in a position where we need to ensure that is not the case as a club. We don’t have millions in cash reserves. All our financials are published on the record. We don’t have the luxury of running losses year after year.”
The frustration of East Fremantle fans will be further increased by a financial bonanza reaped by fierce Port rival South Fremantle from the WA Day derby last week at Fremantle Oval.
It is believed South grossed more than $200,000 in gate, food and beverage and function receipts from the game with a crowd of more than 7400 attending.
The club’s profit after expenses from the game is likely to be somewhere between $100,000 and $120,000.
Those figures would raise the importance of getting back onto East Fremantle for the Sharks home derby which is scheduled for August 3.
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