Despite no call being made on Nathan Buckley’s coaching future at last night’s Collingwood board meeting, the wide ranging review from Pies football Chief Geoff Walsh was presented, and supposedly behind closed doors.
However, according to Channel Seven news presenter Tim Watson it appears the Pies didn’t pull out all the stops to keep some of the findings from the public eye.
He revealed that media outside were able to film through the window and see some of the findings on a whiteboard inside the meeting.
“What they did yesterday is they actually went through a little bit of a rehearsal for their actual board meeting, and it (the blueprint) was up on the whiteboard,” Watson said on SEN Breakfast.
“The media were outside, and you could see through the window there, so if you were cheeky enough you might have been able to film and actually see part of what the presentation was about.
“Mark Stevens was there representing Channel Seven, he sees this stuff on the whiteboard, he shoots it through the window.”
Watson said while the whole blueprint wasn’t on the whiteboard, there were plenty of pertinent points.
“This is what was up on the board – mentor for coach, more investment, players want head of footy to be more visible, list management in for restructure, skills need more focus, kicking and goal kicking big focus, players want leadership engaged more, playing group want more engagement in list management decisions, review and repair TPP over the next 12 months,” he said.
“That is part of what they discussed. I don’t think that’s the blueprint in its totality, but that’s a component of what took place.
“They’re drilling down on where they haven’t performed well this year.”
Former Melbourne captain Garry Lyon admitted to being surprised with the suggestion that the players wanted more engagement in list management decisions.
“Players aren’t in that position to make decisions on list management,” he said.
“I wonder if that’s a reaction to the Chris Mayne deal? It’s a decision now in hindsight that the whole footy world, not in hindsight, at the time looked at it and went 500k for Chris Mayne?
“Maybe the players in their interviews have gone, we don’t want to be seen to be critical, but that decision has cost us a player that can play and contribute week in, week out, so who makes that decision?”