While the club refused to clarify the legal manoeuvring behind the delayed decision, Fairfax Media understands that a fully constituted meeting of the Essendon board could be required before any decision is ratified. Hird, who had lost the support of the majority of the board, was on Thursday attempting to sound out directors in a bid to save his job. Key moments in James Hird's coaching career In another day of drama at Essendon, Little and his team debated the legal ramifications and timing of Hird's removal and then held talks with the coach who had further antagonised the club by refusing to withdraw his decision to appeal. Hird said in a statement that not appealing the Federal Court decision was tantamount to telling a lie. This was despite the Bombers' decision not to appeal. He departed the Tullamarine meeting on Thursday saying he was "still the coach". This is despite the fact Hird had met Little in one of his South Yarra offices on Wednesday where the outgoing club legend was given the opportunity to resign from the club with a nominal payout. The other option was that Hird would be sacked. Little remained hopeful Hird would resign.

Thompson departed for overseas after a breathtaking speech at the Crichton Medal count in which he declared his passion to coach the club next season. Fairfax Media understands Thompson spoke in the belief Hird was departing. Any remote chance of the two men working together next season ended with Thompson's speech. While Thompson's manager Michael Quinlan contacted the Gold Coast on Tuesday before Guy McKenna's sacking was announced, Thompson has told influential Essendonians his strong preference is to coach the Bombers. And in a separate development, Essendon had settled its long-running legal dispute with former high-performance boss Dean Robinson in a deal expected to cost the club almost $1million. The removal of Hird and the closure of the Robinson case will come after AFL chairman Mike Fitzpatrick told Little last week to bring an end to the costly and messy fallout from the Essendon supplements, which has 34 former and present facing bans. Fitzpatrick told Little the competition could no longer tolerate Essendon going rogue against the interests of the game. Wealthy and influential Essendon supporters have been urging Little to act on Hird with the view that even a costly payout of up to $1.25 million would be preferable to the ongoing damage to Essendon's image and the erosion of its culture.

Even the urging of senior players led by Brendon Goddard and Dyson Heppell on Wednesday before the best and fairest would not sway the coach from appealing. Previously he had insisted his only motivation was to clear the names of his players. He insisted to push on Thursday that the players were his prime motivation. However, support for Hird had already been irreparably eroded well before his decision to act. At the traditional grand final week past players' function, former Essendon footballers were unanimous that Hird must go. lso emerged that a group of disenchanted potential challengers have this week abandoned plans to stand for the board in the event of expected vacancies. Former Melbourne Storm boss Ron Gauci and ex-player Justin Blumfield were part of a group supporting a push to install a block of new directors onto Little's board in a bid to challenge his control.

That group met this week and formed the view that it was not prepared to carry the potential cost of mounting a challenge in view of the rebuilding job ahead.