In the context of the competition and where we’ve been in the last six years, it’s been okay. Being 6-5 would have been a lot better than 5-6, even though it’s only one game. Still, we’re a game off fourth and just outside the eight.
We would have liked to have done better, but you’ve got to respect the competition and what we’re trying to do with some younger players and where we’ve been in the last six years – battling away to try and hang in there after some sustained success.
You’ve talked about the mental challenge that the players face each week in what’s a really even competition. How have you gone as a coaching staff trying to manage that?
Part of coaching is emotional and part of it is analytical. The emotional part happens on game day and straight after it. The analytical part happens during the week. We’re aware of what our group has been through and been able to achieve over six years.
We’re also aware of trying to get young players in and we’re also aware that other clubs have had early draft picks and are going to start coming at some stage.
You’ve got seven of your last 11 games against teams currently in the top eight. Two of those against Collingwood and another against Adelaide – both of whom have had your measure in recent years. It’s a pretty tough second half by any stretch of the imagination.
It’s always tough. With the competition at the moment, I don’t think there’s any game you can take for granted. You can look at the ladder, you can look at the draw, you can look at all those sorts of things but the only predictable thing out of the season to this stage is Geelong being undefeated. With all due respect to St Kilda, who we all thought were going to be a good side, you couldn’t have predicted they would be undefeated. You couldn’t have predicted Hawthorn would be 6-6 but they’ve had a lot of injuries. People picked Richmond to be in the eight. The season is unpredictable so I don’t think you ever look at your draw.
What you do as a club is look at where you’re at and clearly if we lose a couple of games over the next few weeks then you’re trying to fast-track for the rest of the year.
Having lost the last two games heading into the split round, how important is the round 12 game against Collingwood at home?
It’s a big game. Every game in the back half of the year is going to be big, depending on how many you’ve won and lost. It’s a big game in the context of the season.
Given the up and down nature of your season, have you stuck to the methods that have served you so well in the last six years or have you re-evaluated?
Depending on how we go over the next two or three weeks, that’s when you start to re-evaluate but generally we’ve stuck to our philosophies. We’ve changed things a little bit in terms of personnel – young players come in and they play differently – but the philosophy in terms of coaching has remained consistent for six and a half years.
You said at the start of the season you were worried that your short list – due to the pre-season retirements of Tadhg Kennelly and Nic Fosdike – would start to bite as the season wore on. Are you starting to find that now?
It’s been harder, definitely, with not many guys to pick from. Probably the thing that made it harder is the younger players getting injured. We’ve got a lot of injuries to our younger players and it’s been our more experienced guys that have been able to stand up, apart from Leo Barry. There’s no question that we’ve picked guys this year that haven’t been in good form because of the list size and the injuries that we’ve had.
You’re getting to the stage of the year where clubs begin to look towards the draft and list evaluation. How important is it to get a look at the young guys who haven’t played much footy?
It could be very important and you’ve got to be very mindful of that. While we’re still competitive, we’re still striving to put a combination of young players with experienced players, but there may be a point where some of the experienced players have to step aside just for the sake of playing kids. We’re not at that stage yet but certainly we’re very aware of where our team is heading in terms of demographics and the challenges that the draft and the salary cap present when you are in the final eight for six years in a row.
At this stage, hopefully it’s just a combination of kids coming in and we can keep looking at them, but there may be a point where you change that philosophy to more kids and try to fast-track them, or just to have a look at them to see whether they’re going to be around at the end of the year.
The fact that your young players just haven’t been able to get on the park to prove their ability must be very frustrating.
Yeah, it is. Patty Veszpremi (finger, 10 weeks) has been one that we really hoped would advance this year. Brett Meredith had been going well but he went back to the reserves and broke his arm. Tim Schmidt (knee) and Brendan Murphy (shoulder) haven’t played at all; Lewis Johnston (foot), our first-round draft pick, probably won’t play for the rest of the year so there have been some significant injuries to the younger players and it has been frustrating, but every team goes though that.
The Swans are likely to be one of the teams trying to rejuvenate and refresh their lists in this period where there are draft concessions to Gold Coast and Western Sydney. How close is that to the top of your mind when evaluating players?
It’s going to be tough. It’s not a great time to be going down near the bottom of the ladder. It’s going to take a lot of lateral thinking and a lot of hard thinking from the recruiters and some really important decisions need to be made. It’s an interesting period coming into the time of compromised drafts in the next three years.
Does that then make this year’s draft more important for you as a club?
No question. We’ll talk to our recruiters about how many picks they want and how good the kids are. It is definitely a really important draft.
What about your older players – Barry Hall, Brett Kirk, Jared Crouch, Michael O’Loughlin, Leo Barry – who are coming to the end of their careers. Hall has said he’s got 11 weeks to push his case for a spot next year. How do you view it?
All those guys would say the same thing. They’re all smart enough to realise. Leo’s come out and said this is probably going to be his last year; Crouchy’s had a lot of injuries, so generally players know where they’re at. Those five guys, we’ll continue to monitor them throughout the course of the year. They’ll be considered as part of our list management and where we’re heading.
Are the Swans better placed to weather the storm of draft concessions given you’ve got significant, positive experience with recycling players?
We’ve done that really well as a footy club, so hopefully we’ll be able to continue to do that well over the next three or four years and just target certain players who, for whatever reason, haven’t played well at other clubs or they’re looking for an opportunity. It’s certainly something we’ll continue to look at.
How important is it for the club to avoid bottoming out on-field while it’s going through this process?
It’s important for the club and the AFL. The AFL is talking about bringing in a second team in Sydney – for us to finish the next two or three years in 13th, 14th, 15th – particularly going into 2012 – could be disastrous for the AFL. If the AFL had a team in Sydney, the Sydney Swans, that was 15th in 2012 and the West Sydney whatever-they-are that was 18th would be a complete disaster. I don’t think it’s a great marketing and promotional tool for the AFL.
Back to on-field matters, at the start of the year you were wary of the new rules coming in, particularly the rushed behind rule. What are your thoughts now?
The rushed behind rule has been good. It probably wasn’t explained to us as it actually has turned out. Everyone felt that there were going to be a lot more instances of rushed behinds. But any pressure and any doubt goes to the defender. There probably would have been a lot more calm had that been explained a bit better.
But in terms of the rules, it’s just a hard game to umpire. I’ve really noticed – and I think the commentators have noticed – a real change in focus over the past two weeks. We’ve noticed it as a coaching group and the players have noticed it. Where that’s come from, I don’t know. We didn’t get any notification from the AFL but it certainly seems like there’s been a change in philosophy over the past couple of weeks.
How frustrating is that for players, when they’ve played nine rounds and they feel that interpretations have been altered?
It’s frustrating for all parties. Watching the games, the commentators generally give you a feeling about what everyone’s thinking and I sense that a lot of commentators make a lot of comments about the rules seeming to have changed over the past couple of weeks. I think the fans probably notice it and players notice it as well.
Do you have a chance to air those concerns, and how much are they listened to?
We constantly talk to the umpires and they would say, even if you ask them today, that there hasn’t been a change in the rules. I see the umpires as like coaching – if you feel there needs to be a greater emphasis on something, that’s okay, as long as you let the clubs know. I don’t mind getting an email on the Friday saying, ‘look, just to let you know, we don’t think we’ve been protecting the ball carrier enough and we’re going to put some more emphasis on that,’ then at least the clubs know. But the common thing coming out of the umpiring is that we just pay them on their merits and we umpire every game the same and there’s no emphasis on one particular rule each week. You’ve got to take that on face value.
To your eye, is that not the case?
I think most people would agree that the last two weeks have been very different to the previous nine.
Finally, do you have any particular strategies to address the club’s fluctuating form in the second half of the season?
The strategy is more about the players themselves. Sometimes 11 weeks, mentally, becomes a lot more doable than 22 weeks. It’s very hard for players to look ahead and say we’ve got 22 weeks but often the break comes and you start to say, ‘oh, we’ve only got 11 weeks to go’. It’s just an individual thing, the consistency, and it’s just about every player preparing themselves for the second half of the year.
