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The sacking of Mark Neeld has taught Melbourne a few lessons: don’t gamble on a coach who has never been tried out before nor a coach who came from a successful background, such as Port Adelaide or Collingwood.
The last two coaches to have unsuccessfully led Melbourne, Dean Bailey and Mark Neeld, both came from teams that were about to embark on an ultimately unsuccessful grand final campaign against Geelong (Port Adelaide in 2007 and Collingwood in 2011 respectively).
Now, as Melbourne begin the search for their next head coach, one thing is for sure – they must find the most experienced head coach possible, very preferably a premiership coach who has a proven track record.
Former Sydney Swans coach Paul Roos is the best example of this. He came from caretaker coach of the Swans in 2002 to ending the club’s 72-year premiership drought three years later.
It was also during his tenure at the Swans that he managed to get the best out of the players he inherited from Rodney Eade, and turned ordinary players such as Brett Kirk, Adam Goodes and Jude Bolton into superstars of the club.
The latter two, along with Ryan O’Keefe and Lewis Roberts-Thomson, have since become dual premiership players under the tutelage of John Longmire, who has been in the Swans coaching system since 2002.
When Roos elected to stand aside at the end of the 2010 season, thus handing control of the Swans to his right-hand man, Longmire, he stated that he no longer had the passion to continue AFL coaching, instead choosing to spend more time with family and his sons, who were about to embark on their last few years of secondary schooling.
But with Mark Neeld’s sacking, he may want to change his mind, with Melbourne reportedly set to offer him an irresistible contract to try to help rebuild the club from the bottom up.
Under Paul Roos, the Swans were rarely thrashed, but their biggest loss under his reign was by 73 points, ironically, against Melbourne late in the 2010 season.
The Demons at the time were coached by Dean Bailey, and it was argued that it was that match in particular that would appear to mark the rise of the Demons and the downfall of the Swans.
But it would turn out to be a millstone. A little more than two years after that match, the Swans would revel in only a second premiership in less than 80 years, with John Longmire at the helm, while Melbourne went backwards, sacked Dean Bailey and then appointed Mark Neeld to much fanfare.
This year, the Swans have continued going their successful ways under Longmire, while Melbourne are dug themselves a hole too deep for them to climb out of. So many heavy defeats, and very little progress over the last 18 months have resulted in Mark Neeld being sacked at half-time of his three year contract.
With Neeld gone, the Dees’ attention quickly turned to Paul Roos, who turned the Swans from pretenders to contenders in the space of three years well over a decade ago.
Roos may not have had the best coaching percentage in his heyday, but there is no doubting that he left a huge legacy on the Sydney Swans, and AFL coaching, when he left the club at the end of the 2010 season.
Not only did he leave the club in good shape than when he found it, the club has since gone on to achieve greater things (such as the 2012 premiership).
And now they are well on track to defend their premiership.
If Roos is appointed the next head coach of the Melbourne Football Club, then he can turn the club around the exact same way Ron Barassi turned the Swans around two decades ago.
In 1993, Barassi inherited a group that had just come off a wooden spoon season.
While on-field success wasn’t instant, he was able to raise the profile of Australian rules football in a city which is dominated by rugby league, and was successfully able to lure Tony Lockett up north from St Kilda.
By 1995, his hard work started to show through results on the field, as the Swans rose to 12th on the ladder. Additionally, Paul Kelly won the AFL’s highest individual honour – the Brownlow Medal, in a side which was starting to show a lot of improvement.
Another highlight that year was that the Swans were just one of two clubs to defeat the all-conquering Carlton side which marched all the way to the premiership.
Barassi left the club in a much better state than when he found them.
And from there the Swans just got better and better and have only missed the finals in three completed seasons ever since (in fact, the year after Barassi left, the Swans made the grand final but lost to North Melbourne).
And there is no doubting that Paul Roos will have the ability to turn Melbourne around the same way Barassi did with the Swans.
But one will have to think about the massive task that he faces as he attempts to turn the club into a competitive one on the field in the years to come.
Roos will inherit a dispirited playing group, that is for sure.
Perhaps his first task will be trying to find a leader that can actually lead on the field by example, and look to extend the contracts of its senior players such as Nathan Jones and Mark Jamar.
In particular, he could also work with James Frawley and look to model his game around that of Leo Barry’s.
Frawley is a proven defender, as illustrated by his inclusion in the 2010 All-Australian team, but he will very likely have to endure playing under a seventh coach by 2014.
Roos is a successful man and has a track record of turning things around.
His youngest son is about to embark on his Higher School Certificate (as it’s called in New South Wales), so any speculation that he could become Melbourne’s next head coach may have to wait until November.
While he won’t coach Melbourne to its first premiership in half a century, he can learn from what Ron Barassi did at the Sydney Swans and use that to his knowledge to turn Melbourne into a competitive unit, a promise which was never fulfilled when Mark Neeld was appointed head coach in 2011.
In the meantime, Neil Craig, who himself is an experienced coach, having taken Adelaide to five consecutive finals series between 2005 and 2009, will have half a season to try to field a competitive Melbourne outfit for the remainder of the season.
Even if he does, somehow, manage to win Melbourne more games than it has over the last 18 months, it’s very clear that he won’t be a part of the club’s rebuilding plans next year.
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