It's getting hard to say yes to Ben CAROLINE WILSON
March 21, 2010 ONE year has passed since Ben Cousins made his debut for the Richmond Football Club in front of a highly charged, almost sold-out MCG. The anticipation was fever pitch in the days that led up to that game, which will go down in football history as one of the AFL's more memorable anti-climaxes.
Remember the feeling beforehand though? Former Essendon coach Kevin Sheedy had returned to Tigerland and led the push to recruit Cousins. He told the players at the heavily attended guernsey presentation that they could steal a premiership and Richmond was tipped by many to make the eight.
Cousins was under financial duress and had enlisted the support of AFL Players Association boss Brendon Gale to call off what was apparently becoming, for him, untenable tabloid media scrutiny. Then he decided that rather than beat them, he would join them and, under the guidance of manager Ricky Nixon, he became a ghosted newspaper columnist.
It all fell apart for Richmond on that chilly MCG autumn night when Cousins tore a hamstring. Coach Terry Wallace never recovered from the humiliation and the Tigers, after a number of micro-skirmishes, took a deep breath and realised they must once again start all over - dramatically but effectively this time.
Gale is now their CEO, Sheedy has moved on and Nixon, after a bitter financial falling out with the player he fought to resurrect, no longer does Cousins' bidding. He also has blamed Cousins' drinking on the split. Wallace has been banished and has all but disappeared from the AFL landscape and Richmond has placed its faith in his diametric opposite in Damien Hardwick.
Twelve months on, as Hardwick attempts to transform the Richmond Football Club from a team scorned for its selfishness, skill and lack of four-quarter commitment into a hard, respected and perhaps, one day, even feared playing group, it is worth examining once again whether Richmond did the right thing in backing itself to back Ben Cousins. My answer one year ago was yes. Today it is no.
Despite a carefully-worded denial released by the club several days ago key figures within the club continue to confirm that the Tigers have been provoked on more than one occasion over the past year to warn Cousins to curb his drinking. There is no shadow of doubt he has over-indulged in alcohol on too many occasions since going to Tigerland and no shadow of doubt that something went horribly wrong for him pre-Christmas.
Although the club denies he ever ''went missing'' during the off-season, there were many nervous moments and the club would not want to endure another summer like the one just gone where a long-term and, hopefully, recovering drug addict is concerned. It was confirmed again several days ago that Cousins was told some three months ago to lift his game where the pre-season was concerned.
The club remains mystified regarding Cousins' stomach illness, which has seen him hospitalised twice over the past 10 days. Although no one has ever suggested binge drinking led to the illness, it is beyond doubt that drug addicts should not over-indulge in alcohol. Richmond keeps a close eye on Cousins' activities and there have been too many dubious sightings for anyone's comfort.
The good news is that towards the end of the week the player himself was "training the house down'' and could still shape up for Thursday night's season-opener. His form last season over 15 games earned him a top-five finish in Richmond's best and fairest and the players have certainly talked up, on occasion, Cousins' work ethic on the track and his superb example where on-field skill and decision-making are concerned.
It is not Cousins' fault that 2009 went pear-shaped for the club. In fact, Andrew Demetriou described him at one point as a great source of pride for Richmond in an otherwise dreadful year. It is less certain what Demetriou thinks now and certainly both the AFL and the Tigers have had a gutful of the speculation surrounding the documentary, the book, the gangland connections, the happenings that may or may not have taken place in Thailand last summer, the constant meetings with AFL doctor Harry Unglick and all the baggage that continues to cling to this troubled man.
Cousins' off-field battles and the recent controversies are not in themselves enough to mount an argument that the club might have been better off without him. And who knows what his freakish talent can produce this season? But surely there is some lingering doubt as to whether he is the best example for a very young group of players.
This is not to suggest that Cousins is directly a bad influence because he remains by all reports a relatively solitary member of the playing group where social activity is concerned. But surely the fact that he is treated so differently to any other player and operates under a different set of rules is not helpful as Hardwick fights to eradicate the long-standing culture of division and selfishness at Richmond.
It was a far more subdued season launch two days ago compared with the fanfare of 2009. Premiership talk had been replaced by the new Tiger buzz word ''transformation'' and Hardwick spoke quietly, but convincingly, about his conservative hopes and assurances for 2010.
As a group, the players looked frighteningly young with thirtysomethings Cousins and Troy Simmons lifting the average in what could prove their final seasons.
Certainly, if you asked Richmond now, it would say that this is most likely Cousins' last year in the AFL. The structure of a home-and-away football season and a more generous and still bonus-driven playing contract is hopefully just what the doctor ordered.
That at least provides the short-term solution.
http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/its-getting-hard-to-say-yes-to-ben-20100320-qnbg.html
