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A captain walking out on his club is a magnificent headline for a media outfit, but is obviously the worst outcome possible for a football club.
It’s even worse when it’s one of the AFL’S perennial stragglers in recent years, the Western Bulldogs.
Their skipper, best player and the team’s heartbeat, Ryan Griffen, has decided to leave the Dogs with time still to run on his current contract and play with the Greater Western Sydney Giants.
Rumours and trade whispers had been flowing during the past 24 hours of this first week of the trade period that the Giants were positioning themselves to pounce again.
Mind you, I don’t think anyone thought they would pounce like this, with the Bulldogs completely sideswiped after Griffen had met with coach Brendan McCartney before going overseas to iron out some issues that existed between the two.
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Griffen said after the meeting he would be willing to work with McCartney, but obviously he’s changed his mind. The Dogs got on the front foot after a board meeting and released a stinging statement condemning Griffen’s actions and saying he wasn’t up for trade.
But how can they stop it?
Even if Griffen is their best player and skipper, it is fraught with danger to try and change someone’s mind. It seems his relationship with the coach can’t be mended.
The club could sack the coach, but it’s still tough for Griffen to stay. Anyway, president Peter Gordon has said the Dogs are committed to McCartney, who has two years left on his current contract despite having won just 20 games.
There seems to be a major breakdown in the relationbship between the senior players and McCartney, with Shaun Higgins off to North Melbourne and Liam Jones, bordering on being an experienced senior player, wanting to play with Carlton.
There’s also Adam Cooney, one of the Bulldogs’ best outside midfielders, who is on borrowed time at the Whitten Oval. The Dogs are apparently not against moving the Brownlow medallist on, if the right deal comes their way.
With Griffen keen on the Giants, the Dogs have to move on and get the best deal possible. They already have pick six, and they should be targeting the Giants’ first selection and hopefully one of their many young tall forwards.
There are plenty to choose from in Jeremy Cameron, Tom Boyd, James Stewart and Adam Tomlinson. The Bulldogs have to play hard ball here and make sure they get a good deal.
With those top five picks they are more than likely to take two more talls, and as they continue to try and finalise a trade to get Geelong fullback Tom Lonergan, their key defensive and forward posts would start to look imposing.
Their midfield will lack pace, but McCartney will have mainly his own recruits, with the exception of Bob Murphy, Matthew Boyd and Will Minson.
He has picked his own coaching and support staff mainly from Geelong, but with so many more young players coming in, next year could be another tough one as part of this long rebuild. But at the end it will be the house that Brendan built.
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