Another minor premier failure

Another coach is gone, most likely forever.  Former Adelaide coach Neil Craig resigned on Monday after almost seven years in charge.  It was an emotional and necessary exit, one that spares all involved more innuendo and grief.

 

Craig was appointed as Adelaide’s fitness advisor in 1997 under Malcolm Blight.  He revamped training leading into the 1997 and 1998 finals campaign, ensuring the Crows were at peak fitness.

When Gary Ayres quit as Adelaide’s coach midway through 2004, Craig took over as interim coach.  In 2004 the Crows finished 12.  A year later, Adelaide finished the season on top, with 17 wins and five losses.  Amid the fanfare, the bookies installed Adelaide as premiership favourites.

It’d been some year.  But the first qualifying final exposed Craig’s game plan, and he was outcoached by Grant Thomas.  St Kilda’s Robert Harvey had 31 possessions and kicked three goals in a low scoring game, proving the difference, with the Saints winning by eight points.

After the game Craig was asked why he didn’t put a tag on Harvey.  He suggested Harvey hadn’t been too influential.  Two weeks later, West Coast defeated Adelaide by 16 points in the preliminary final at Subiaco.

Craig’s first full season in charge had been ruined.  His second season was similar, Adelaide finishing second in 2006 with 16 wins and six losses.  A win over Fremantle secured a home preliminary final against West Coast, which resulted in another defeat, by ten points.

Through his first five years as coach, Craig guided Adelaide into the finals, a great effort with a good list.  The loss of star players, Andrew McLeod, Tyson Edwards, Mark Riccuito and Simon Goodwin robbed his team of class, experience and grunt.  The Crows missed the finals last year and have won just four games this season.

Craig, as all coaches are, can only be as good as his list.  Simply, Adelaide has an ordinary list when compared to 2005-06.  Given a change in fortune, particularly injuries, Craig might’ve coached Adelaide into a grand final.

Instead, it took a 103-point loss to St Kilda to prove to his time was up.  What could’ve been will never be.  Adelaide, under Craig, wasn’t good enough.  Questions were asked at the end of 2010 about his methods but he vowed to coach on, to help build Adelaide’s list and improve the club.

Former Australian captain Ian Chappell is a sage.  When asked about retirement, Chappell is unequivocal.  ‘You want people to ask why are you retiring instead of why haven’t you retired,’ Chappell said.

‘It’s time,’ Craig told the media at his exit press conference.  ‘To continue would hurt the Club, given the negativity and distraction that my own role has become.  We have clearly underperformed this year and as senior coach, I take the responsibility for that.’

Taking responsibility as an AFL coach is not negotiable.  Many of the players who are complicit in his decision to quit will go on under a new coach, such is the cycle of football.

It’s no one’s fault.  The blame lies collectively, but Craig must bear the brunt.  From 166 matches, he coached 92 wins, not a bad effort.  Five times he guided Adelaide into the finals.  He’s had two poor seasons by comparison and that’s enough to force a decision. 

Some coaches get longer than two poor seasons and suffer bigger defeats than the 103-point loss delivered by St Kilda.  Some career coaches last more than a decade without delivering a premiership.

Football can be a cruel occupation, an industry that rightly recognises premiership coaches as great coaches.  It matters not if a coach puts it all together for one season.  The AFL lauds achievement, and there is no greater success for a coach than winning a premiership. 

Robert Walls won a premiership at Carlton in 1987 then rebuilt Brisbane for years.  Despite the premiership, Walls isn’t regarded as a great career coach, rather, a man who made everything work for one season.  Richmond’s Tony Jewell and Port Adelaide’s Mark Williams will be remembered the same way.  Their achievement is not diminished by their lack of success in later years.  Only their legacy suffers.

Other coaches barely have a legacy.  Craig was a good coach but he was exposed by the lack of maturity and talent on his list, as all coaches are. 

Since 1970, 22 clubs have finished a season as minor premier and squandered the best chance of winning the premiership.  Finishing on top is a remarkable achievement, but for the coaches who couldn’t complete the journey, that achievement is largely forgotten amid the AFL’s rich history.  It becomes another meaningless statistic.

The table below shows the clubs and the coaches who finished on top and didn’t win the premiership.  The asterisk denotes coaches who had previously won premierships, or would win them in the future.

The + indicates the eight clubs who didn’t play off in the grand final.

Year	Club	Coach
1970	Collingwood	Bob Rose
1973	Collingwood	Neil Mann+
1975	Hawthorn	John Kennedy*
1976	Carlton	Ian Thorogood+
1977	Collingwood	Tom Hafey*
1978	North Melbourne	Ron Barassi*
1980	Geelong	Bill Goggin+
1982	Richmond	Francis Bourke
1983	North Melbourne	Barry Cable+
1990	Essendon	Kevin Sheedy*
1991	West Coast	Mick Malthouse*
1992	Geelong	Malcolm Blight*
1996	Sydney	Rodney Eade
1997	St Kilda	Stan Alves
1998	North Melbourne	Denis Pagan*
1999	Essendon	Kevin Sheedy*+
2001	Essendon	Kevin Sheedy*
2002	Port Adelaide	Mark Williams*+
2003	Port Adelaide	Mark Williams*+
2005	Adelaide	Neil Craig+
2008	Geelong	Mark Thompson*
2009	St Kilda	Ross Lyon

 

Of the list above, ten coaches did not or have not won a premiership.  Finishing the season on top guarantees nothing.  Legendary coaches of the game, men like Kevin Sheedy, Blight, Tom Hafey and Ron Barassi have guided clubs to the minor premiership only to falter when it matters most.  Winning premierships is tough, much harder now than it was in the seventies, and it was always hard back then.  Being the best isn’t always good enough, not when form and injury conspire against the greatest game plans.

Neil Craig was a good coach, but he’ll be forever remembered as former Adelaide coach, not a former Adelaide coach who led his club to the minor premiership.  History is kind, on a superficial level.  Coaches, like players, are remembered for their achievements, not what they almost did.

It’s easy to focus on Craig’s limitations, how he was unable to turn consecutive top two finishes into a premiership, that he wasn’t able to reinvent himself and his club when the stars got old.  His lack of charisma and basic game plan will be dissected again and the pundits will suggest he had to go.

That is to do him vast disservice.  Only one club finishes on top each year.  To coach the minor premiers is an achievement, but that achievement is singular without a premiership to back it up.

Craig quit because he had to, people can argue about the timing, but in his departure it must be remembered he was once a good coach, and with better luck, a few goals here or there, he might be quitting as a premiership coach.

Football is a tough, unrelenting game.

Coaching is no different.  Dozens of men throughout AFL history led teams to the minor premiership.  They could’ve altered history for just one season if they just got it right, if their players put it all together, when it really mattered.

Instead, another coach quits.

When he had to.  Another former AFL coach…

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