COACH Paul Roos says the right people have come together to form Melbourne’s leadership group for 2015.
The leadership group for 2015 consists of Nathan Jones (captain), Lynden Dunn (vice-captain), Daniel Cross, Chris Dawes, Jack Grimes and Heritier Lumumba. And Roos said it was a strong cross-section of players to lead the club.
“James Frawley left [for Hawthorn at the end of last season] and Col Garland was pretty keen to really concentrate on his footy and Trenners (Jack Trengove) has a long term injury,” he told Dee TV.
“To have Crossy, who has played in finals, and to have Dawes and Lumumba, who are both premiership players is really important because you’re trying to create standards and those guys are the ones who know what [the] standards are to win premierships and win finals.
“I think it’s really good. You’ve got a good mix [of people]. You’ve got guys who have seen the hard times here and they’re really keen to come out the other side and play some good football and win some games.”
Roos said the elevation of Dunn to vice-captaincy was “a terrific effort”.
“Probably externally he’s seen as one of those players who’s played in a number of roles and has been around the club for a long period of time, but externally people wouldn’t realise how much he’s valued within the Melbourne footy club,” he said.
“Coming in as a coach from another club and having been involved in this footy club, you probably see him as a good player who can play a number of roles.
“But I’ve been super impressed with his season last year from a footy point of view – probably up until round 18 or 19 he was in All-Australian contention.
“But his impact on the players [is strong and] he really drives the group. He was probably the one that surprised me, because you just don’t know a lot about him and you don’t hear a lot about him. He’s been very good at driving the standards.
“More importantly, he’s played some very good football in the last 12 months.”
Roos said Lumumba had made a genuine impact since arriving from Collingwood last October.
“The players looked at him from day one and hoped he would be a good player from day one … he’s probably exceeded everyone’s expectations to be perfectly frank,” he said.
“Most leadership groups now are voted by their peers … to be able to do that in such a short space in time gives you an idea of the impact he has had in that period.”
Roos added that Grimes, who was co-captain from 2012-14, was still an integral part of the leadership group.
“Ironically, he’s probably better placed to be captain now than what he was, but I think he made a really smart decision [to relinquish the co-captaincy],” he said.