Hardest part is letting go
By Mic Cullen
2:36 PM Fri 17 October, 2008
EVERY time of the year seems to bring new challenges for football clubs, and the off-season is no different.
Post-season means it's time to get the list and the club ready for next year, and AFL regulations dictate that you will delist several players, like it or not.
Senior coach Terry Wallace said the process was a tough one, especially given the close-knit nature of a football club.
Greg Tivendale had already retired, and the Tigers told Chris Hyde, Danny Meyer and Travis Casserly that they wouldn't be offered new contracts.
"It's bloody difficult. Bloody difficult," he said.
"The most difficult thing in most businesses – unless the business has got problems – is letting people go because they haven't stacked up, their work ethic hasn't been strong enough, or they haven't been able to achieve what you've wanted them to be able to achieve.
"Ours is a little different in the fact that they can be the most honest, loyal, hard-working people, and if they just don't cut the mustard, you've got to let them go.
"And that's hard, because you know that in some cases, if the bloke's 26 years-of-age and he's been playing footy since he's been six or seven years of age, then that may be it.
"And they're the difficult ones."
Wallace pointed out that while people often refer to "the list", it's not just names on a computer screen so much as a group of blokes earning a living doing what they love.
"It's a tough time because it's people.
"You grow fond of them – you try not to get too close, so that it's still a business and you're a manager of a business, but given the nature of this sort of business, you still get pretty close."
The process of deciding what changes to make starts about midseason, Wallace said.
"It's a moving object, the whole time.
"I suppose when we start the process of it, after the half-way mark of the year, you start working in areas – definite stays, most-likely stays, discuss for trades, most-likely go, definite go.
"What happened a month ago doesn't necessarily mean anything about where you are now, both positive and negative.
"I don't lock people into 'that's who he is and that's what he is' – I might have an opinion that a bloke looks likely to go, and if he plays well enough, I'll change my mind on him, I'm quite comfortable to flex like that.
"People do change the categories they're in."
http://www.afl.com.au/News/NEWSARTICLE/tabid/208/Default.aspx?newsId=69062
