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I speak as an independent third party on behalf of tens of thousands of angry Richmond and Western Bulldogs supporters.
In danger of stating the bleeding obvious, Richmond and the Dogs haven’t looked like adding anything to the trophy cabinet in recent years.
They’ve had promising patches: The Tigers of 1995, 2001 and again quite recently, and the Dogs between 1992 and 1997 and again and again these past few years. But, no grand finals. And worse, a persistent doubt that always hangs over them – where is the menace? The killer instinct?
Carlton looks like a dung heap at the moment, and if Essendon made the finals this year it would be turned into a cheesy feel-good tele-movie, but the idea of either club getting off the canvas and winning a premiership within the next five seasons doesn’t seem far-fetched.
Maybe it should, but it doesn’t. Why? Because they’re Carlton and Essendon. They win flags. They are “that sort of club”.
At first glance this looks like bullshit, but there is undeniably a powerful psychology that affects the destiny of footy clubs.
Saint Kilda lost their first 48 matches in the VFL, and took 69 years to win their solitary flag (from 118 seasons and counting). They’ve fielded great sides since 1966, but glory has eluded them. Bad luck? Bad timing? Or, as Malcolm Blight put it, a club culture “500% worse” than any other?
Even after the agonising drawn grand final in 2010, the dismal flogging the following weekend seemed a depressing forgone conclusion.
The Sons of the Scray joined the league in 1925 and won their flag in 1954. Since then, not a brass razoo.
Richmond are a different story, many decades of success followed by 33 years without a grand final – and indeed long stretches without finals footy at all. Both sides are currently blessed with a good crop of players and decent game plans, but both seem a crucial inch or two short of the front runners.
There are two key ingredients missing. Self-belief and ruthlessness – on and off the field.
The 22 years between the 1967 and 1989 grand finals dented Geelong’s self-belief. After losing the 1989 grand final by a solitary goal, the frustration grew. Another loss in 1992. Another in 1994. Again in 1995. Indeed, in the entire period 1991-1999, the Cats reserved their two worst performances for the ‘94 and ‘95 grand finals. Why? It gets under your skin. It gets into your head. Like a batsman on his duck while the dot balls accumulate, the heat builds until something wilts.
But, the Cats provide ample evidence that the spell can be broken. 2007, ’09 and ’11 speak for themselves. Now the club conducts itself as though the next flag is right around the corner, and anything less is unacceptable.
Much of the Cats success lies with the drafting genius the club has showed since 1999, but much of it lies in the ability to strut, to make the other guys doubt.
In recent years Hawthorn and Geelong have been as ruthless off the field as on it. They have talked big and walked big, recruiting ambitiously, playing ambitiously.
Richmond and the Dogs, on the other hand, seem to have been perpetually rebuilding. They even look fairly timid at the table.
The Dogs made a big play for Tom Lonergan, and rightly so given their height worries in defence, but neither club looked at Paul Chapman at the end of 2013.
Chapman was a ferocious ball-winner with great goal sense – and a natural leader. After Richmond and the Dogs ignored him, Chapman played 20 games, racked up 398 possessions and kicked 22 goals in the 2014 season.
That same season, Richmond finished eighth but was 11th in terms of scoring. Was the club satisfied with scraping into the finals with a pop gun attack, one outperformed by four of the sides who didn’t make the finals, including Gold Coast and Carlton? Jesus wept.
The Dogs had a terrible 2014 and really ought to have been looking for some experience, skill and hardness of the kind Chapman still had in spades.
At the end of last season, both clubs ignored Steve Johnson.
In 2015 Richmond were ninth in scoring. Last season Johnson played 20 games for 30 goals and 14 goal-assists. Perhaps he only has one good season left in him, but one good season is all the Tigers need. They are not rebuilding. They should be aiming for a top two finish.
The fate of the two ex-Cats aren’t the whole story, but are emblematic of a seeming lack of ambition from the Tigers and Dogs.
The Tigers generate a lot of drive, and they defend resolutely, but once forward the excitement seems to fade. There’s doubt. They forget how to finish the job. The Bulldogs play beautiful football and know how to score, but on the big stage the defensive midfield pressure vanishes – allowing the better sides to capitalise on the space generously provided.
In a game where the difference between disappointment and immortality comes down to the millimetre, adding one or two tough, canny players into the mix could spark either long-suffering club to premiership glory. The puzzles are almost complete for both sides. Perhaps in 2016 the final pieces will fall into place.
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