Rodan grows under Wallace
Chip Le Grand
The Australian
February 10, 2005
THIS is how fast footballing fortunes can change.
Last September, at the end of a miserable season at Punt Road, David Rodan picked up a local paper and read his name among half a dozen being considered for the chop.
Two months later, with the Tigers back in full training, Rodan heard his name again. Only this time it was new coach Terry Wallace urging every other Richmond player to be more like him.
Just like that: from trade bait to coach's pet in the space of six weeks.
"The style of play we want to put in place suits David," Wallace said yesterday. "When I first arrived, I thought the standard of training was pretty average. They weren't used to the run and flow and carry. David was the first one who really got it."
The Richmond style and Rodan's style are now one and the same. Wallace wants his young team to run aggressively and take opposition players on; to break a line and make something happen.
For Rodan, who has never known any other way to play, the mantra is music to his ears.
"I was a bit happy to hear that," Rodan said.
"Over the last couple of years, because it didn't go so well, a lot of boys went back into their shells. Some of the boys lost confidence, the team lost confidence. I was definitely one of the players who lost confidence in myself. And then Terry has come along."
Painful though it was, Wallace believes Rodan would have learned a lot from last year. After playing 44 consecutive senior games in his first two years in the AFL, Rodan was forced to confront injury and omission, loss of form and confidence.
As the season dragged on and Richmond's troubles refused to relent, Rodan found himself under unfamiliar scrutiny. At 171cm and a solid 82kg, was the Fijian-born Rodan the wrong shape to be an AFL footballer? Of his 44 senior games, how many were by default of Richmond's woeful playing depth?
"It is confidence as much as anything," Wallace said. "When you have got guys who have come through the under-18 system, it has all been up. Most of them haven't dealt with a flat spot in their careers. It was probably the first time in his life he had to get over a couple of troughs."
Rodan is reluctant to revisit those troughs now. Relaxing in the stands after an intraclub match at Victoria Park yesterday, he said the best thing about 2004 was that it was in the past.
"Everyone had their own way of dealing with it," Rodan said. "I spent a lot of time with my family and my girlfriend and they helped me get through it. I also have a lot of mates who I grew up with and we don't talk about footy at all."
For the Rodan family, the brightest sporting news of 2004 had nothing to do with Richmond. Midway through the season, Rodan's younger (and slightly taller) sister Helen earned a basketball scholarship at a Texas university.
When it comes to Richmond's 2005 prospects however, Rodan does not try to conceal his excitement. Where the primary goal for the club is to pick itself off the bottom of the ladder, Rodan's personal ambition is to establish a regular spot in the midfield.
For three years under former coach Danny Frawley, Rodan was trialled in positions all over the field. With the Tigers well served by experienced on-ballers, there was no ready-made midfield spot for Rodan, who tended to drift forward and back, on and off the bench, and in and out of games.
For Wallace, there is no question where Rodan should play.
"Personally, I think he is a midfielder. That is where he is going to play the bulk of his footy. He is quick and he is fit and we have got a few blokes who are either-or," Wallace said.
"He has done everything right in this point in time to say that is where he is heading. But good sides have competition and if you are not performing, someone else will step up and step over him. I would like to think that is his spot but he will make that decision, not me."
If yesterday's intraclub was any guide, Rodan will play a key midfield role in any Richmond revival. At the end of an arduous pre-season campaign, Rodan has emerged injury-free and with improved endurance. He also realises that at 21, he is older and more experienced than half the players on the Richmond list.
"Definitely with all these new guys coming in, I feel like I need to step up and show them around," Rodan said.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12202870%255E2722,00.html
