Voss pays price for miscalculations at Lions

Almost five years into his coaching tenure, the jury was still out on whether or not Michael Voss could coach.

The Brisbane board would have hoped to have had a definitive answer to this question by now.

The fact there wasn’t one was perhaps an answer in itself.

The Lions had fallen off the map under Leigh Matthews after he’d famously taken them to four consecutive grand finals from 2001-04, winning three premierships in a row in the process.

2005 saw them drop straight down to 11th on the ladder as an ageing list began to feel the full toll of so many brutal, unforgiving finals campaigns.

Lethal’s men played it as hard as it was possible to play, led by their skipper Voss, who never took a backward step.

Three years of middling ladder positions later, having neither bottomed out to rebuild nor been good enough to climb again, Matthews stepped aside for the favourite son Voss to step in.

Voss had been on public record suggesting he needed to do an apprenticeship at another club after time spent in the media, and had in fact taken up a position as assistant to John Worsfold at West Coast just weeks earlier.

Ideally, Voss would have had a year or two to reacclimatize to the AFL scene. But Brisbane was never going to appoint anyone else.

Voss was always going to be the senior coach there at some stage, so it had to be immediately.

Together they took the leap, and in the first year the results were positive.

Fourteen wins in 2009, a jump to sixth on the ladder for a victorious home final against Carlton. Things were looking up.

A look at Brisbane’s best players in that winning final is instructive.

Simon Black, naturally. Daniel Bradshaw and Jonathon Brown with nine goals between them. Luke Power, the tireless workhorse.

All greats of the club. Premiership teammates of Voss. Could he get them another flag before retirement beckoned? The consensus within the club was that they could.

The decision was made to top up the list with ready-made players from other clubs to lift the side into the top four and become a contender again.

A host of good, ordinary players were brought in, none of whom were able to have the intended impact.

Andrew Raines, Xavier Clarke, Amon Buchanan, Brent Staker and Matt Maguire were either traded for or drafted. As a collective, they didn’t work.

The big name landed to bring premiership glory was, of course, Brendan Fevola.

The explosive full-forward was one of the biggest names in the game, a two time Coleman medallist who brought not just exquisite on-field skills, but a particular set of off-field baggage.

Four rounds into the 2010 season, every move was being hailed as a masterstroke, the Lions unbeaten and second on the ladder, with Fev leading the way on top of the Coleman Medal standings.

Brisbane would only win seven of the next forty games. Say it slowly. Seven of forty. From a team that thought it could seriously challenge.

Daniel Bradshaw had to be sacrificed to accommodate Fevola, a popular club stalwart who won that final for Voss, treated shabbily in the rush for the fool’s gold that the ex-Carlton full forward became. It can be seen now as the key trigger of the club falling apart.

Michael Rischitelli was also put up for trade in the Fevola deal, but stayed on to win the 2010 best and fairest as the club was going down the hole.

It has been suggested that the sting of betrayal was a reason for him walking out to join the fledgling Gold Coast Suns.

Jared Brennan, an unfulfilled talent in football if there has ever been one, also left at the end of 2010. Mitch Clark, arguably worthy of the same label, followed a year later.

During this time, Fevola was involved in one incident after another, become more notorious for his off-field scandals than anything he’d ever done on it.

How much did this period of miscalculation ultimately play in the dismissal of Voss?

In terms of the decision-making itself, not much. As a favourite son, Voss was entitled to one’get out of jail free’card, and the clubs rebuild was only delayed by a year.

They missed out on a first round draft pick in 2009, and had to let go of another, Lachie Henderson, in order to get Fevola to the club.

Of greater concern was that in terms of pure draft picks and the development of them, the Lions have had very few’hits’during Voss’reign, and we can go back further to include the latter years of Matthews.

Looking at picks inside the top 50 from 2001 and onwards, only Daniel Merrett, Jed Adcock, Matthew Leuenberger, Daniel Rich and Jarrad Redden could be considered success stories. Sam Mayes looks like he could be another one.

Even then, not one of these players has been an All-Australian, and there is only two best and fairest wins between them.

It’s a staggeringly inadequate drafting period. Disgracefully so. Roughly the same amount of wins as Melbourne over the same timeframe. Even Richmond, the most notoriously poor user of the draft in its history, would feel an air of superiority over the Lions.

Did the coaching staff at Brisbane under Matthews and Voss develop their draftees, or was it recruiting that let them down? Was it felt that respected premiership players would lead by example, and show newcomers the way it should be done? If so, it wasn’t enough.

The Lions made some progress last year, and finished brightly, albeit mainly against teams whose season was shot. It gave Voss’supporters hope that there was light at the end of the tunnel.

This year has been a similar story, but have enough players improved over the course of the season? It’s hard to think that many have.

Was Michael Voss just another version of Danny Frawley? Or could he have become Mark Thompson with another couple of seasons of faith from those in charge?

Maybe he’s a decent coach, but it feels like there are better out there. The Brisbane board is obviously of the same opinion. Have they got someone locked away already?

Paul Roos was immediately attached to the vacancy, as he invariably is. The Fitzroy connection is one for the romantics at the very least.