DEVELOPMENT and strategy coach Brendan McCartney speaks publicly for the first time since joining Melbourne. He speaks to Matt Burgan about his first year at the club, how Simon Goodwin will be a ‘fantastic’ coach and how the squad is developing in the first of a two-part series on melbournefc.com.au …

MB: Brendan, it’s great to be speaking with you. This is the first time you’ve spoken publicly since joining Melbourne. Why now?

BM: Why’s it taken a while? I’ve been too busy – training up our players and getting stuck into helping us get better and win more games. It (media) hasn’t been a priority and I think it’s really important for some of the other coaches too to learn that side of the game and take their turn. It’s probably a good time to speak to people and remind a lot of people who love our club out there that we’re definitely heading in the right direction. It’s been a bumpy four or five weeks, but there are a lot of good things happening internally that haven’t quite materialised yet – and will though, very soon. I’m quite sure.

MB: You joined Melbourne in February. How have you found your first season at the club?

BM: It’s been terrific. When you’re a club that’s only won six games, but hopefully seven, you know there have been some ups and downs. We’ve had a couple of losses that send you to bad places and some days where we clearly haven’t been good enough and in the game. But we’ve also had some terrific wins, which you get to witness after games, when you’re down on the bench and get to see the joy on people’s faces. That’s something I’ll never forget as a coach and a football person – how much joy a good win brings to people, who have had to endure a fair few losses in the first few years. It’s been a good year and it’s been a really satisfying year seeing a lot of people learn more about their game and learn what playing well looks like for them. Just as importantly, when they don’t have a good game, [they can ask:] ‘what are the reasons why and what wasn’t in my game today that didn’t allow me to play well?’ At the same time, [we want] to embed two or three things into this playing group that historically stack up. [We want] the ability to consistently win contests and put pressure on the opposition around the ball. We’ve fallen away a little bit in that, which has exposed us in some other areas, because we have become quite reliant on it. But it doesn’t cause me any angst or Roosy (Paul Roos) any angst because we both know that’s what you’ve got to build your teams around – the ability to handle a contest and create contests and build from there. History will show most of the great teams have had that. It’s fallen away a little bit, which has opened us up in other areas, but it’s much better to do it this way.

MB: Can you offer a snapshot into your day-to-day role at Melbourne this year?

BM: I get the train most days from Geelong, which I enjoy. It gives you an opportunity to walk Melbourne and walk around a fantastic precinct. I do some work on the train and talk to people about footy and answer their questions. My days here are pretty full. It was quite an open-ended job when I started and it was around development and being available to the coaches, with experience and ideas. In a nutshell, I spend a lot of my time working with the younger guys and just as much time with the people who are in and out of the team. If I see something in a player’s game that can help them, I’ll either speak to them or their line coach. I’ll help supply training drills that replicate how we want to play on the weekend and be a good ear for the coaches and spend some time helping them develop as coaches in this system. Everyone talks about player development being critical and it is – it still is the most critical thing, to develop your talent and give them the opportunity to have a career and learn what good team play looks like. But it’s just as important to develop your coaches and develop their intellect, IP (intellectual property) and their ability to deal with all personality types and deal with the pressures of winning and losing and help them be [career coaches]. It is a career path for a lot of them. A lot of them had good playing careers, but it’s also a good career path. So there’s my day. It goes very quickly and it’s a really good place to work at. It’s a very good coaching group to work with and the players are good to work with. Are they all progressing at the speed we want? No. Are some progressing quicker? Yes. And that’s the same in any club. Rarely is it just this classic linear improvement. It’s up and down for a lot of people, but it’s been a good nine months and I’m starting to get a good handle on the club and a good understanding of what it’s about. I’m really enjoying the job.

MB: You’ve come to the club having been a senior coach in your previous role. You’re now working with another senior coach Paul Roos and with his successor Simon Goodwin. What’s it like to be in that position?

BM: Paul’s been fantastic to work with. He’s very receptive to alternative ways of looking at things and suggestions, but he still has – and deservedly so – a really strong self-belief in his proven methods. There has been a good sample there. He’s got a great sense of humour. He’s good to be around and he’s good to talk footy with and he’s good to talk anything with. I’ve learned a lot off him. I’ve learned a lot about people management and player management off him. I think I’ve been able to bring some of my strengths to the club and they’ve filtered through the coaching group. Simon’s going to be a fantastic coach. That was obvious when I worked with him at Essendon five years ago. Within a week, I just knew that. He was a young man – and it was no secret the player and leader he’d been at Adelaide – that was driven. He’s still got a down to earth style about him, where he can relate to all personality types, but still find a way to educate them and share his really deep knowledge of the game. Right from day one, he had a great understanding of the game and now through his five years with Hirdy (James Hird), Bomber (Mark Thompson), myself and Roosy, he’s probably taken bits of all of us and added to his own coaching style. The club’s in very good hands and the key now is to surround him with a good mixture of youthful ambition and a little bit of experience, so we’re doing things well, but in not too much of a hurry. [We just want to] do it right, so that it’s a good build and a sustainable build.

MB: You’ll play a key part when Simon Goodwin takes over as coach at the end of the 2016 season. How will your role change and what will it look like?

BM: It’ll be heavily involved in coach development and education, so if we decide we’re going to teach the game a certain way and educate the players a certain way that we’re on track with that and we don’t deviate from that. If we go down a path with certain types of players and personality types – that we stay aligned with that. So we link the recruiting to our development to our coaching and to our player retention. We’ll keep an eye on where the game’s headed and what’s actually happening every Saturday afternoon in the AFL, so that we’re up to speed with that and our training reflects how we want to play. Linked with that is ensuring every player from our most credentialed player on the list through to our youngest boy on the list has a development plan that we’re aligned to. Then we stick to it and develop him along those lines. We [need to] do the very best we can to give every person who is brought to our club – in a playing sense – the opportunity to have the best career they can have. That’s the role and I’ve said it pretty simply, but every time I read it or see it up on a whiteboard, more things get added, so it’s probably going to be pretty busy, which is how I like it anyway.

MB: You’ve seen a lot of AFL lists in your time. What do you make of Melbourne’s list and its talent?

BM: There is a good core of experienced players, who through a number of experiences have become a very resilient group – and still have an ambition to become better. People shouldn’t have too many fears or doubts about the young talent in this club. There is still more work to be done, but there are some types of players and personalities that our recruiting boys are out looking for and they’re finding them. If you look at what’s gone before us, this season and last season, they’re getting it right. They are bringing in young men that look like they belong at the level and we’re really confident.

MB: You’re pretty adamant that the team is on the right track.  

BM: I can speak confidently that they’re being taught the game well, with a good balance of empathy. They’re being taught their positions well, which is really undersold in this industry. There is still a way to play your position. It mightn’t look like it and it’s not like the old days, where people stayed in their eighth of the ground or their 10^th of the ground – they’re all over the place, but there is still a way to play all positions. They’re being taught that well. They’re being taught something that I believe is really important – thelink between their actions and the rest of their team in a positive and not so positive way. When they play their position well, [they can see] the benefits their team gets. When they move away from what’s expected in their position, [they can see] what stress it puts the rest of the team under. There is a lot of good young talent coming through and the club’s been brave. They’re been brave quite a number of times, but right where I sit now, history will judge what the recruiting people are doing at this club – [and that’s] a very, very good job. [They’re] bringing boys in who are going to end up tough, strong, resilient, skillful Melbourne footballers for a long time.

MB: You’ve been regarded by many in the game as the best development coach in the AFL. How do you feel about that title?

BM: I don’t think too much about it. When you coach, your responsibility is to try and get the best out of everyone. Do you do that right every time? No. There’s no coach on the planet that gets it right with every player they ever work with. I’ve always been passionate about helping people. In essence, football is a selfless game. It’s a team sport and when you work in a club, it’s a selfless environment. In an ideal world, you give to the club, you give to your players, and you give to your workmates. It’s difficult to get that right all the time but I’ve always tried to do that. I’ve always tried to tap into people’s strengths, but also align them with the team so to create a freedom to play, and remind all young kids and even older players, that they’re in the system for a reason. They’ve been brought into the system because they play well against people their own age at that time and that’s why they make it and others don’t. When they get there, the quicker that they can align themselves to their teammates and the club, the easier it will be for them. I’ve always believed in that, but I also believe they don’t mature mentally and mentally deal with the game at this level until they physically mature. So, I don’t think too much about the title. You just try and do your job well and help the club you’re working for.

MB: What do you make of the notion of ‘fast-tracking’ players in development?  

BM: Everyone talks about fast-tracking young people but I don’t believe you can do it. They all mature at a certain rate. That young talent that I spoke about – there’s enough young talent here and enough young talent on its way. The trick now and the key is that they need to be coached and they need to be managed and taught the right way. I don’t think that every club has done that well but I think that you’ll find historically, the strong clubs – the clubs that stay at the top for a long time – are very good at that. They have a clear picture of the type of personalities they want in their group, the type of player they want. We’re all looking for the same thing: tough, strong, resilient and competitive people who can play.

MB: If you could summarise ‘development’ what would it be?  

BM: When I first started in the system – where people were brought in purely on talent – it’s now maybe more character than talent. Recruiting people can go and watch young people play and if he’s a good young player, the next question is what’s behind that person? Is he going to be a good boy to coach? Is he the sort of boy you want to work with and invest time into? Is he a good listener and receptive to feedback? Is he going to listen to requests from coaches about adding things to his game or maybe modifying his behaviour? That’s probably a little snapshot on what developing talent is all about. But it’s not just young people either. I had one year with [Essendon’s] Dustin Fletcher and he was prepared to add things to his game. [Former Geelong player] Tim McGrath, at the end of his career 15 years ago, was prepared to change and modify his game. There are senior players here now that Roosy, Goody and myself are sitting down with, asking them to add different dimensions. That’s development. Everyone’s developing – we’re all developing as people and coaches.