Tank is weapon of choice in basement battle
Grant Thomas | July 8, 2007 | The Age
IT'S around this time of year that the key decision-makers within football clubs work out their strategies for the rest of the season. They have two options to consider. The attraction of each is proportionately lucrative, the rewards potentially defining. One is the quest for the AFL premiership cup and the other is the quest for the AFL draft cup.
The latter has come a long way extremely quickly. It has been more traditionally referred to, in somewhat derogatory fashion, as the "wooden spoon".
How times have changed. Where once teams had been highly motivated to avoid the ignominy of the wooden spoon, now we have a system that makes it a tantalising object of desire.
At the start of every AFL season, all 16 clubs have high expectation of playing finals football.
The previous season's cellar-dwellers make plans and adjustments that, if all goes well, will put them in the final eight. The sides that just miss out anticipate they will eke out some improvement that will allow them to take the next step. The finalists are looking to consolidate and ensure they make the necessary adjustments to take the next vital step. The premiership team is looking to put the silverware behind it and build on the intimidation factor it has earned.
In essence, if you stay the same, you go backwards. Commensurate improvement maintains the status quo, but probably doesn't get you there. Significant organic improvement, with astute development and recruitment and dramatically sharpened processes — that is the key. On top of all that, a little help from lady luck can make all your dreams come to fruition.
Once you have taken care of all of the controllable issues, you sit and hope like hell that the uncontrollable things, such as the vagaries of the draw and injuries to your players and to the opposition, fall in your favour.
There are many uncontrollable aspects to an AFL season that will take too long to outline, but you get my point.
By the mid-season break, the 16 teams that start the season full of anticipation and excitement become more like 10 to 12 that still have finals hopes.
Four to six teams already have made a decision they cannot make the finals, so are duty bound to look after the best interests of their club. They effectively have "put the flag up". That can only mean the draft for the following season and this is where a problem is emerging.
Clubs are tanking the season.
In the past, irrespective of circumstances, the embarrassment and dishonour of finishing down the bottom of the ladder carried with it a stigma that everyone in football detested and avoided at all costs. Confidence was down across the club, and you busted your butt to gain respect and dignity. You did not want to be associated with an embarrassing era of your club's history.
If the truth be known, that's why I invested the time and effort at St Kilda that I did. It wasn't an overnight revelation — it was the disgust and abhorrence of having been involved and responsible for one of the darkest eras in the club's predominantly dark history.
Now this is a revelation. Things have changed. You no longer are castigated and admonished for finishing down the bottom of the ladder.
You are called courageous and brave — akin to taking the bullet for the betterment of the club. You were prepared to make the selfless decisions to ensure the club gained the best advantage at the draft table. Do it for a couple of seasons and you get the Purple Heart of valour.
That's right — for orchestrating pee-poor performance! It is now called genius and a smart ploy.
I do not for a minute say that players tank games. Most of what I am talking about revolves around the club's decision-makers.
Players are assessed at the halfway mark and are suddenly out for the year with surgery to prepare them for the following pre-season. Young players are given more games and more game time to stuff their development. Or is it to cloud the real motive?
Older players who are at their competitive and aggressive best in the twilight of their careers, and possibly in their final year, are either retired, told they will not be played or just ignored.
Puzzling interchanges and even more baffling match-ups seem to arise during the latter half of the season. It will be interesting to see the Melbourne and Carlton match today.
What is the effect of all this? Well, that is what cannot be accurately defined at this time.
We can pontificate and debate the virtues of not having to play any of the teams that have raised the "white flag" in the last half of the season, but at the end of the day, the best team has to win the last game of the year and that is the grand final.
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