Talking Tigers fail to walk the walk
Caroline Wilson | March 29, 2009
JUST as there has never been a build-up to a season-opener like the hoopla that punctuated the months, weeks and days leading up to Thursday night's game between Richmond and Carlton, it is impossible to remember a more thumping letdown. The shocked disappointment in Richmond's performance has reverberated around the football community.
The Tigers' predicted resurgence had most football fans excited, not least the AFL. A quality clash between the rival titans of old was one for the romantics, just as it was for the entrepreneurs, even before Richmond took its calculated risk on Ben Cousins.
To sit among the sell-out crowd at the MCG proved a surreal exercise in human deflation en masse. The roar when the Tigers ran out onto the ground tripled that of Carlton's for all the Blues' pre-season promise, and when Matthew Richardson marked up forward in the opening minute, there was a tantalising glimpse of what might have been.
If the crowd's hysteria was deafening then, the stunned silence of Richmond supporters after half-time was even louder.
Murphy's Law prevailed for the Tigers on Thursday night. Put aside the financial result, and everything that possibly could have gone wrong did. Thank heavens for Richmond that club memberships are not refundable, although it was an economic opportunity lost when you consider that the Blues' telephone lines and supporters' credit cards reportedly went into overdrive on Friday.
Shock on Thursday night turned to denial turned to anger turned to finger-pointing. The blame game has been astute at times, frenzied and random at others, just as the media's predicted ramifications have been occasionally ridiculous. A history of weak boards, failed coaches, poor recruiting, dreadful football skills and a lack of intensity on the playing arena borne from selfishness and a comfortable group of footballers that has yet to show they truly desire success haunted the team that failed to give a yelp against Carlton.
Coach Terry Wallace is under the pump, as he should be, although to suggest that the media in a matter of weeks will be calling for Kevin Sheedy to step in shows a complete lack of understanding of football commentators and journalists, who know to a man — and woman — that Sheeds will never coach again.
If Wallace was to be replaced mid-season, then the obvious choice in the short term — and perhaps longer — would be Wayne Campbell, whose return to the Tigers was far more ominous where the senior coach was concerned than Sheedy.
But Wallace, who has been notoriously pessimistic about the Tigers' prospects in the past, entered 2009 believing he had a team capable of playing finals. His club believed he had the manpower capable of delivering a game plan which was hopefully not the terrified rabbit-in-the-headlights short game witnessed three nights ago.
The biggest problem for the coach is that his players froze on the big stage in a similar manner to the way they did in his very first game at the helm of the Tigers against Geelong in round one 2005. Just how far the playing group has come since then is a disturbing question, and those who will decide Wallace's fate must be asking themselves why he could not instil a sense of belief in the players.
The media hype surrounding Cousins did not sell-out the MCG; Cousins and his messy back story combined with his past brilliance and potential on-field clash with Chris Judd did that. His role in Richmond's failure was that of a cameo. Whatever the means, the end result of recruiting Cousins saw a notoriously weak club back its supposed improvement to state it could handle whatever sideshow Cousins came to represent.
Unfortunately, the club and the player are at crossroads now. Cousins, despite his property portfolio back in Western Australia, is desperate for money to complete his documentary, which is losing value by the day and has sold himself to the media reasoning that if he cannot beat them, he might as well join them. Richmond wants him to be one of a team and yet has reaped handsomely from his individual notoriety. Not ideal.
The Tigers also backed themselves to cope with the heavy symbolism of Sheedy, who told the players at the season launch they could win the flag. But Sheedy again will have proved an amiable sideshow should Richmond recover from this and reach the finals.
It is impossible to analyse Richmond's malaise without returning to the crucial national draft of 2004. Danny Frawley had been removed by Greg Miller and Clinton Casey and replaced by Wallace. Miller and Casey were in election mode and campaigned on Wallace's five-year plan and the club's five top-20 draft picks.
Richmond picked up Brett Deledio, Richard Tambling, Danny Meyer, Adam Pattison and Dean Polo. Hawthorn, with three top 10s, took Jarryd Roughead (after Deledio), Lance Franklin (after Tambling) and Jordan Lewis. Carlton, with one top-10 pick, took Jordan Russell.
The following year, the Tigers had one top-10 pick and took Jarrad Oakley-Nicholls. Carlton, with two top-10 picks, took Marc Murphy and Josh Kennedy, who became part of the Judd trade. That was 3˝ years years ago. Say no more.
As recently as 2006 (Graham Polak for pick No. 8 ), the Tigers were trading away top-10 draft picks for older players. The first and most expensive lure of the Miller era (Nathan Brown for picks 6 and 20) has been a costly failure.
The public and media response to Richmond's capitulation on Thursday night was not an over-reaction. The Tigers and their soon-to-be-out-of-contract coach deserve all the scrutiny they will get.
But the club demanded the spotlight pre-season, reaped the benefits and must now endure it. The good news for Wallace — and pardon the pun — is that it's still only March.
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