Saturday, October 31, 2009

The modern coach

No comments:
I had the chance last week to hear Leigh Matthews speaking at a function. Four-time premiership player, four-time premiership coach — probably knows a little bit about the game. . .

The comment that interested me most concerned the modern, that is the “noughties”, coach. In 1986, when Matthews was appointed to the Collingwood coaching job, he was full-time, but most of his players and any assistant coaches were not. He was, effectively, the only conduit to the players.

Step forward to 2008 and Matthews’ final year as coach at Brisbane. Not only are the playing group full-time employees of the club, so too are the assistant coaches. Matthews’ role was no longer to coach, but to manage a group of men who did the coaching on his behalf.

This notion has stuck in my mind pretty firmly and is leading me to question my own pet theory about AFL coaches (see Coaching credentials, Coaching credentials, part 2 and Coaching credentials, part 3).

It is now the assistant coaches who have more direct influence over the average player’s preparation and mindset. The head coach manages and motivates the team of assistant coaches to manage and motivate the playing group.

Now, of course, this is a simplistic scenario and can only go part way to explaining how a football team at the elite level functions. Nevertheless, it does serve to illustrate that the need for a head coach to have those qualities that influence the bottom 15–20% of the playing group to excel is much reduced. The modern head coach is a senior manager/executive. I think this has been a subtle change, in process for perhaps a decade or more.

One thing that doesn't change, until there's some convincing evidence to the contrary — like a spate of Buckley-coached Magpie flags, is that really gifted players aren't your go-to guy to win the club premierships from the coaches' box.
Read More

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Video village

No comments:
The AFL appears determined to embrace video-assisted decision-making technology in some way, shape or form. The ‘goal’ awarded to Geelong’s Tom Hawkins during the Grand Final — an exceptionally close Grand Final, it’s worth noting — has provided a context.

In the widespread discussion of the issue across many fora, there appear to be two ‘camps’: the We must use all available resources to ensure we have the correct result EVERY time camp; and the It doesn’t happen often enough to worry about it camp.

Let me say at the outset that I think video-assisted decision-making, even if only for balls in close proximity to the goal posts, is applying a sledgehammer to kill a mosquito.

Who will decide when a video decision is required, and on what basis? Would Darren Milburn's claim in the grand Final that he'd touched the ball be prima facie context for a video decision, for instance?

Will the game cease while a video decision is sought? For NFL, NRL and cricket, there are natural pauses in the game that lend themselves to extension for examination of crucial on-field decisions. But who has not endured the countless indeterminate replays required for such a decision to be made and bayed at the officials (even via the TV screen) to “Get on with it!”

In the NFL, head coaches have two opportunities per game to query on-field decisions and a sanction — loss of a time-out — attaches to an unsuccessful challenge. There's no applicability of these concepts to Aussie rules.

In NRL, the referee chooses when to refer a touchdown decision to the video official. Which official on the AFL field will decide to refer to the video official? The goal umpire is hardly going to query his own decision, but might be pressured by circumstance into making a non-decision, i.e. I don't know, so refer it. For the field umpires, it will depend on positioning whether they have an appropriate context to decide whether a decision be referred or not. Or will the video official or (gasp!) media people alert the field umpire that a decision is questionable? If the latter, who will judge their independance and impartiality?

Cricket, even with it natural breaks in play and general slow pace anyway, is transformed into a funereal spectacle by the slow-mo replay. The looming opportunity for teams to query 2 decisions in a Test innings, a la the NFL challenge situation, only adds to the problem. There's little synergy here with AFL either.

Finally, and the clincher in my view, a video-assisted goal umpiring decision presumably will stop the game. In today's game, the loss of the chance to bring the ball back in from a point as quickly as possible disadvantages the defending team to an astonishing degree. We've seen, in 2009 at least, the spectacle of opposition cheer squads hurling a ‘lost’ ball back onto the field of play, disrupting a kick-in, allowing the defending forwards to set up or adjust their defensive zone.

The AFL have gone to astonishing lengths in recent seasons to speed the game up and remove unnatural breaks — immediate kick-ins from points without waiting for the flags to be waved, 50-metre penalties for time wasting — yet are now considering a process that will bring the free-flowing game to a screeching, shuddering halt.

It just doesn’t make sense!
Read More

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Moral guardians

No comments:
Reports that the AFL will impose a significant ban on Brendan Fevola "if he is found to have sexually assaulted a woman on Brownlow Medal night" raise some interesting questions.

What standard of proof will be required? Will it be enough for the journalist in question to simply make a statement, or will a police complaint be required? And who will judge whether the offence was committed?

These are very murky waters the AFL is peering into. Where will their moral stance end? Will a driving offence bring an AFL sanction as well? What about bankruptcy or fraud? Will a conviction in a court of law be required?

It’s easy to understand that the AFL is attempting to protect its brand in signalling this action against Fevola. But they would do well to think through the implications before proceeding — their precedents in the laws of the game changes suggest they’ll shoot first and ask questions later!
Read More

Trade Week is destructive

No comments:
Over at Big Footy, on the Essendon board, there’s been much handwringing over comments by Alastair Clarkson in relation to the rumour of trade talks on Campbell Brown.
"I know the Essendon footy club did that back in 2002 with Damian Hardwick, Blake Caracella and Justin Blumfield and also Chris Heffernan, and I don't think it did the Essendon footy club any good, sending out players of that quality, it affects the culture of your club too much." [Clarkson is quoted as saying.]
Many of the Essendon fans took umbrage at this comment, mostly, it must be said, in the wake of the indecorous actions and comments of Clarkson and others following the Round 22 game against Hawthorn.

Regular AussieRulesBlog readers will be aware that, even as an avowed Bombers man, I have long promoted the very same notion as that advanced by Clarkson. I remain convinced that the invisible ‘fabric’ of a mighty team was rent by those trades.

It must also be noted that those Essendon trades were a result of salary cap pressures.

More recently, we have been witness to the spectacle of Brisbane bending over backwards to do a deal to acquire the services of one Brendan Fevola. I noted in a recent post that Brisbane may regret their enthusiasm for that trade.

A story in The Age today reports that Daniel Bradshaw has rejected the offered contract from Brisbane and is considering his future. The part of the story that sparked me to write this post was:

“...[Bradsahw was] stunned that his club of 14 years would try to shunt him into a trade.”

It's a matter of record that Rischitelli rejected Carlton's advances and was the initial reason that the Fevola/Bradshaw/Rischitelli version of the Fevola trade fell over.

In the series of “rejections” in this story lies the destructive evil of Trade Week.

Brisbane “rejected” Bradshaw and Rischitelli by offering them up in Fevola trade mark 1.

Bradshaw certainly appears to have decided to reject Brisbane and reward them with the same sort of loyalty they displayed to him. We’ll  have to wait and see what further ramifications there may be from Rischitelli.

And that’s to put aside, for the moment, how the other members of the playing group regard the treatment of their teammates and the imposition of Fevola. Perhaps we’ll find out how that one pans out when the Lions start playing again and Voss needs  an extra effort to get over the line. . .

Lest I be accused of cloying sentimentality, it's worth mentioning a couple of other trades. Andrew Lovett and Essendon had agreed that it was time they parted and Lovett was afforded an opportunity to continue his elite AFL career. Good result for all concerned. Mark Williams, for whatever reasons — and I think there may be quite a few — asked to be traded to Essendon and that proved to be part of the deal to send Burgoyne to Hawthorn. Again, a good result all 'round. The difference? These players had made their own decision.

I think Brisbane and Voss will regret their decision to pursue Fevola, but it will be the remainder of that playing group who will always be looking over their shoulder, all too aware that their loyalty will not be honoured.
Read More

Thursday, October 08, 2009

Forget the good and the bad, this is plain ugly!

No comments:
News that Carlton and Brisbane are working toward a trade of Fevola for Bradshaw and Rischitelli, apparently if the Lions players can be “convinced” to move, reveals once more the truly ugly end of the AFL system.

No more need be written on the subject of Fevola’s manifold indiscretions.Whether the Blues are well served by moving him on is a moot point. There’s plenty of precedent to suggest a move into a non-AFL-saturated community would benefit Fevola — think Lockett and Hall in Sydney — and a move to a new team environment where there is no history of putting up with his ‘high jinks’ might also work for him.

No, the ugly end of this scenario is Bradshaw and Rischitelli being dragged into the deal somewhat peripherally. Rischitelli has certainly been mentioned in trade discussions previously and there’s a sense that he’d welcome a move back to Melbourne for non-football reasons.

Bradshaw, originally from Victoria, has been a long-term servant of the Lions and provides a very effective foil for Jonathan Brown. Apparently he has made no secret of his intention to move back to Victoria at the end of his playing career. That is, however, a very long way from being an unwitting pawn in some Machiavellian trade deal.

Greg Baum has written an excellent piece on this scenario in The Age. He contrasts the various “loyalties” around AFL, from the fans’ unwavering commitment to clubs’ demands of players. The most telling remark, for me, concerns Hawks legend Don Scott, who, Baum reports, felt more loyalty to the player group than to the club per se. Even this has to been in context, as many will recall Scott standing before an angry Hawthorn crowd and ripping a Melbourne Demons guernsey during the contretemps over those two clubs’ merger plans.

I make no secret of my affection for the Bombers. It’s my firmly-held belief that the Bombers’ great team of the late 90s and early 00s was irrevocably torn asunder by the departure, under somewhat strained and unwilling circumstances, of Damien Hardwick, Blake Caracella, Chris Heffernan and Justin Blumfield within the space of two years. None of the four would probably have been considered a top-flight player in their own right. As a group, the four would hardly have been considered by outsiders as the heart and soul of the Bombers, yet, in the wake of these departures and without the loss of stars, the Bombers went into an almost uninterrupted slide.

I wonder if Brisbane's team fabric could survive the forced departure of Bradshaw and Rischitelli and the importing of the self-centred Fevola, or will it implode as the Bombers’ did a little less than a decade ago.
Read More

The modern coach

I had the chance last week to hear Leigh Matthews speaking at a function. Four-time premiership player, four-time premiership coach — probably knows a little bit about the game. . .

The comment that interested me most concerned the modern, that is the “noughties”, coach. In 1986, when Matthews was appointed to the Collingwood coaching job, he was full-time, but most of his players and any assistant coaches were not. He was, effectively, the only conduit to the players.

Step forward to 2008 and Matthews’ final year as coach at Brisbane. Not only are the playing group full-time employees of the club, so too are the assistant coaches. Matthews’ role was no longer to coach, but to manage a group of men who did the coaching on his behalf.

This notion has stuck in my mind pretty firmly and is leading me to question my own pet theory about AFL coaches (see Coaching credentials, Coaching credentials, part 2 and Coaching credentials, part 3).

It is now the assistant coaches who have more direct influence over the average player’s preparation and mindset. The head coach manages and motivates the team of assistant coaches to manage and motivate the playing group.

Now, of course, this is a simplistic scenario and can only go part way to explaining how a football team at the elite level functions. Nevertheless, it does serve to illustrate that the need for a head coach to have those qualities that influence the bottom 15–20% of the playing group to excel is much reduced. The modern head coach is a senior manager/executive. I think this has been a subtle change, in process for perhaps a decade or more.

One thing that doesn't change, until there's some convincing evidence to the contrary — like a spate of Buckley-coached Magpie flags, is that really gifted players aren't your go-to guy to win the club premierships from the coaches' box.

Video village

The AFL appears determined to embrace video-assisted decision-making technology in some way, shape or form. The ‘goal’ awarded to Geelong’s Tom Hawkins during the Grand Final — an exceptionally close Grand Final, it’s worth noting — has provided a context.

In the widespread discussion of the issue across many fora, there appear to be two ‘camps’: the We must use all available resources to ensure we have the correct result EVERY time camp; and the It doesn’t happen often enough to worry about it camp.

Let me say at the outset that I think video-assisted decision-making, even if only for balls in close proximity to the goal posts, is applying a sledgehammer to kill a mosquito.

Who will decide when a video decision is required, and on what basis? Would Darren Milburn's claim in the grand Final that he'd touched the ball be prima facie context for a video decision, for instance?

Will the game cease while a video decision is sought? For NFL, NRL and cricket, there are natural pauses in the game that lend themselves to extension for examination of crucial on-field decisions. But who has not endured the countless indeterminate replays required for such a decision to be made and bayed at the officials (even via the TV screen) to “Get on with it!”

In the NFL, head coaches have two opportunities per game to query on-field decisions and a sanction — loss of a time-out — attaches to an unsuccessful challenge. There's no applicability of these concepts to Aussie rules.

In NRL, the referee chooses when to refer a touchdown decision to the video official. Which official on the AFL field will decide to refer to the video official? The goal umpire is hardly going to query his own decision, but might be pressured by circumstance into making a non-decision, i.e. I don't know, so refer it. For the field umpires, it will depend on positioning whether they have an appropriate context to decide whether a decision be referred or not. Or will the video official or (gasp!) media people alert the field umpire that a decision is questionable? If the latter, who will judge their independance and impartiality?

Cricket, even with it natural breaks in play and general slow pace anyway, is transformed into a funereal spectacle by the slow-mo replay. The looming opportunity for teams to query 2 decisions in a Test innings, a la the NFL challenge situation, only adds to the problem. There's little synergy here with AFL either.

Finally, and the clincher in my view, a video-assisted goal umpiring decision presumably will stop the game. In today's game, the loss of the chance to bring the ball back in from a point as quickly as possible disadvantages the defending team to an astonishing degree. We've seen, in 2009 at least, the spectacle of opposition cheer squads hurling a ‘lost’ ball back onto the field of play, disrupting a kick-in, allowing the defending forwards to set up or adjust their defensive zone.

The AFL have gone to astonishing lengths in recent seasons to speed the game up and remove unnatural breaks — immediate kick-ins from points without waiting for the flags to be waved, 50-metre penalties for time wasting — yet are now considering a process that will bring the free-flowing game to a screeching, shuddering halt.

It just doesn’t make sense!

Moral guardians

Reports that the AFL will impose a significant ban on Brendan Fevola "if he is found to have sexually assaulted a woman on Brownlow Medal night" raise some interesting questions.

What standard of proof will be required? Will it be enough for the journalist in question to simply make a statement, or will a police complaint be required? And who will judge whether the offence was committed?

These are very murky waters the AFL is peering into. Where will their moral stance end? Will a driving offence bring an AFL sanction as well? What about bankruptcy or fraud? Will a conviction in a court of law be required?

It’s easy to understand that the AFL is attempting to protect its brand in signalling this action against Fevola. But they would do well to think through the implications before proceeding — their precedents in the laws of the game changes suggest they’ll shoot first and ask questions later!

Trade Week is destructive

Over at Big Footy, on the Essendon board, there’s been much handwringing over comments by Alastair Clarkson in relation to the rumour of trade talks on Campbell Brown.

"I know the Essendon footy club did that back in 2002 with Damian Hardwick, Blake Caracella and Justin Blumfield and also Chris Heffernan, and I don't think it did the Essendon footy club any good, sending out players of that quality, it affects the culture of your club too much." [Clarkson is quoted as saying.]
Many of the Essendon fans took umbrage at this comment, mostly, it must be said, in the wake of the indecorous actions and comments of Clarkson and others following the Round 22 game against Hawthorn.

Regular AussieRulesBlog readers will be aware that, even as an avowed Bombers man, I have long promoted the very same notion as that advanced by Clarkson. I remain convinced that the invisible ‘fabric’ of a mighty team was rent by those trades.

It must also be noted that those Essendon trades were a result of salary cap pressures.

More recently, we have been witness to the spectacle of Brisbane bending over backwards to do a deal to acquire the services of one Brendan Fevola. I noted in a recent post that Brisbane may regret their enthusiasm for that trade.

A story in The Age today reports that Daniel Bradshaw has rejected the offered contract from Brisbane and is considering his future. The part of the story that sparked me to write this post was:

“...[Bradsahw was] stunned that his club of 14 years would try to shunt him into a trade.”

It's a matter of record that Rischitelli rejected Carlton's advances and was the initial reason that the Fevola/Bradshaw/Rischitelli version of the Fevola trade fell over.

In the series of “rejections” in this story lies the destructive evil of Trade Week.

Brisbane “rejected” Bradshaw and Rischitelli by offering them up in Fevola trade mark 1.

Bradshaw certainly appears to have decided to reject Brisbane and reward them with the same sort of loyalty they displayed to him. We’ll  have to wait and see what further ramifications there may be from Rischitelli.

And that’s to put aside, for the moment, how the other members of the playing group regard the treatment of their teammates and the imposition of Fevola. Perhaps we’ll find out how that one pans out when the Lions start playing again and Voss needs  an extra effort to get over the line. . .

Lest I be accused of cloying sentimentality, it's worth mentioning a couple of other trades. Andrew Lovett and Essendon had agreed that it was time they parted and Lovett was afforded an opportunity to continue his elite AFL career. Good result for all concerned. Mark Williams, for whatever reasons — and I think there may be quite a few — asked to be traded to Essendon and that proved to be part of the deal to send Burgoyne to Hawthorn. Again, a good result all 'round. The difference? These players had made their own decision.

I think Brisbane and Voss will regret their decision to pursue Fevola, but it will be the remainder of that playing group who will always be looking over their shoulder, all too aware that their loyalty will not be honoured.

Forget the good and the bad, this is plain ugly!

News that Carlton and Brisbane are working toward a trade of Fevola for Bradshaw and Rischitelli, apparently if the Lions players can be “convinced” to move, reveals once more the truly ugly end of the AFL system.

No more need be written on the subject of Fevola’s manifold indiscretions.Whether the Blues are well served by moving him on is a moot point. There’s plenty of precedent to suggest a move into a non-AFL-saturated community would benefit Fevola — think Lockett and Hall in Sydney — and a move to a new team environment where there is no history of putting up with his ‘high jinks’ might also work for him.

No, the ugly end of this scenario is Bradshaw and Rischitelli being dragged into the deal somewhat peripherally. Rischitelli has certainly been mentioned in trade discussions previously and there’s a sense that he’d welcome a move back to Melbourne for non-football reasons.

Bradshaw, originally from Victoria, has been a long-term servant of the Lions and provides a very effective foil for Jonathan Brown. Apparently he has made no secret of his intention to move back to Victoria at the end of his playing career. That is, however, a very long way from being an unwitting pawn in some Machiavellian trade deal.

Greg Baum has written an excellent piece on this scenario in The Age. He contrasts the various “loyalties” around AFL, from the fans’ unwavering commitment to clubs’ demands of players. The most telling remark, for me, concerns Hawks legend Don Scott, who, Baum reports, felt more loyalty to the player group than to the club per se. Even this has to been in context, as many will recall Scott standing before an angry Hawthorn crowd and ripping a Melbourne Demons guernsey during the contretemps over those two clubs’ merger plans.

I make no secret of my affection for the Bombers. It’s my firmly-held belief that the Bombers’ great team of the late 90s and early 00s was irrevocably torn asunder by the departure, under somewhat strained and unwilling circumstances, of Damien Hardwick, Blake Caracella, Chris Heffernan and Justin Blumfield within the space of two years. None of the four would probably have been considered a top-flight player in their own right. As a group, the four would hardly have been considered by outsiders as the heart and soul of the Bombers, yet, in the wake of these departures and without the loss of stars, the Bombers went into an almost uninterrupted slide.

I wonder if Brisbane's team fabric could survive the forced departure of Bradshaw and Rischitelli and the importing of the self-centred Fevola, or will it implode as the Bombers’ did a little less than a decade ago.