THE Greenvale senior coaching job has been a fascinating one to follow in recent years.
From the back-to-back flags delivered under Anthony Rock to the short-lived stint of Adam McPhee and then most recently the two-year stretch under Shannon Grant that netted five total finals – including the 2015 Grand Final.
Grant moved on immediately after the Jets’ Prelim loss to Aberfeldie in September and it took more than month for the new man to stand up.
And it turned out to be a fellow Norm Smith Medallist, who just happens to be an EDFL junior with North Coburg (now Northern Saints).
Paul Chapman has come across from Werribee Districts and will hopefully not only take the Jets back to another Grand Final in 2017, but also be donning the famous green and black as a playing senior coach.
We had a chat to the new Greenvale coach about the challenge he's taken on at Section Road.
How does it sit with you being the new Greenvale coach?
Yeah it’s very exciting to coach in the Premier Division, which in of itself is a good thing. I loved my time in the WRFL last year but stepping up in competition is exciting. We all know how competitive Greenvale has been for a long time and so there is that expectation, but I’m very confident that we’ll continue that and if we’re competitive then we can start doing things after that and you can start playing a certain game plan. But without that competitiveness you’ve got nothing, so that’ll be the first focus. It’s a good foundation to build on here and something that’s embedded into the culture here.
How does it feel to be back in the EDFL?
It’s exciting to be back. Playing in the EDFL as a junior kick-started my career through Calder. Obviously it was at a different club and when I started Greenvale was a very young club and I didn’t know much about them, but I found out pretty quickly that when you played Greenvale you knew you were in for a game and after playing them you knew about it. That’s how Greenvale has been since day dot and it’s still the same, so I’m excited to be here and to be able to coach.
You’re an old North Coburg boy and there are a few connections to the Northern Saints here through the Carusos. Did you have any prior connections with them?
I know Mick quite well. I’ve spoken to Fort and Nat a little bit and when Nat was coaching the Saints I used to get out there and watch them a bit, so I’ve had a little bit to do with them. It’s good to have those guys here, obviously Fort won the B&F in his first year, so it’s exciting that they’re here.
It was a pretty good year for Greenvale despite missing the Grand Final. You’ve already got a fairly good base to work with here. How’s the list looking so far?
Well I haven’t really seen much (EDFL football) so I’m working on getting some game footage from last year. The first thing I need to do is look through it and analyse it. I think Bruce (Kent) is pretty confident a lot of guys will stay but if guys go, I think that gives opportunities for other guys to step up. Under me, we’ll be a footy club that doesn’t rely on a team of champions, it’ll have guys that just need to play their roles. A champion team will beat a team of champions, I believe in that so my message to the boys would be that if you play your role, it’ll be hard for you to get dropped. I’ll be watching for the little things and with my experience coming from Geelong, which was a good team that very quickly jumped to a very good team, it was the little things that stuck out to me that I want to bring to Greenvale.
Not much has happened yet on the recruiting front but safe to assume you’ll start working on that now…
Yeah I’ll sit down with Bruce after looking at some tapes about where I feel we’re lacking a little bit, so looking forward to get stuck into that.
How essential is it for you to be on the field?
To me it’s not that essential. First and foremost I’m a coach, and I’m here to coach and I want to be the best coach I can be and help coach these guys to be better players individually and within the team. I will be training to get my body right to play so hopefully I’ll be ready to go. It’s a good level of footy and you need to be well-prepared to play and I can’t afford to have my body fail me, so that’ll be a test in itself, being 35, how the body will hold up. So it’s not a priority. If I play that’s great, but first and foremost I’m here to coach.
Surely though it’s an exciting thought to get out there and play on some of the grounds you would have grown up playing on…
To be honest I haven’t really thought about it like that and that makes it that little bit more exciting. To play against the old teams I used to play against will be very exciting, but between now and then there’s a hell of a lot of hard work that needs to be done, so I’ll just concentrate on that first and I dare-say I will play next year, unless something serious happens with my body. I just don't want to take the focus off coaching because coaching is the number one priority. I think I’ll have more influence on the club as a coach than I will as a player.
Some of your old mates are retiring from the AFL. Will you tap into that network?
I may, but not right now. I’m just looking forward to working with some new guys in 2017 but down the track, there may be a few guys I could have a chat to and see if they want to come down and be a part of it.
