COACH Paul Roos has flagged some slight alterations to the titles and roles of key personnel in the football department, as the club prepares for Simon Goodwin to take over as senior coach at the end of the 2016 season.
Speaking at Casey Fields on Wednesday, Roos said preliminary talks had already started about how the roles will look like next year and beyond.
“We had a bit of a meeting last week – the key people in the football department about roles for next year and we’ll certainly be changing some of those roles,” he said.
“With Simon 12 months away from taking over – it was always the plan that the second year we’d tailor a role that gives him an opportunity to slip into the chair nicely.
“So that’s something that will evolve over the next five weeks and we’ll come up with some slightly different jobs, but this year he’s been terrific. He loves development and he loves working with younger players, particularly young midfielders.
“He’s passionate about both sides of the football – defensively and offensively, so he’s fitted in really well.”
Roos said Goodwin’s situation would be similar to when John Longmire succeeded him at the Sydney Swans as senior coach.
“Titles don’t really much mean, but there might almost be a new title or a new role, which we create and is similar to what John [Longmire] did [at the Sydney Swans],” he said.
“Having had the experience with John, it is pretty seamless. The good thing with John and Simon is that they’ve both got very similar views, but they’re also a little bit different.
“It’ll create some excitement towards the end of next year and going into the following year, because it’s a different voice and a different person. But what this group craves is some consistency in coaching and consistency in development. That’ll continue for hopefully more than three years, but at least another three years after next year.”
Roos said Goodwin and fellow coach Brendan McCartney had been “exceptional” with the development of its players in their first year at the club.
“Jack Watts is a great example. They’ve both taken him under their wing and they’ve really worked hard with him, so their impact has been enormous,” he said.
Meanwhile, Roos said winning two in a row was “the next step” for the club, as Melbourne prepares for Sunday’s clash against North Melbourne at the MCG. The Demons are aiming to defeat the Roos for the first time since 2006, after they defeated the Magpies for the first time since 2007 last round.
“That’s been a challenge, and the challenge for us as coaches is to make sure the players’ mindset hasn’t changed from last week to this week. We’ll just go and try and play the footy we played last week,” Roos said.
“That has been the challenge for us and that’s the next hurdle. We’ve overcome a number of hurdles, whether it’s winning in round one or [defeating] Collingwood [for the first time] since 2007. They’re the things that are going to happen.
“Hopefully we can keep breaking those footy hoodoos.”
Roos said the past six weeks had been Melbourne’s most consistent patch of football since he’s been at the club.
“Even in the losses we played well for three quarters against the Eagles and [against] Essendon we kicked 7.18, so there has been some good signs, but consistency we haven’t had two in a row,” he said.
