“I knew”: Inside Mark Neeld’s Melbourne sacking

Mark Neeld coached the Melbourne Demons through one of the toughest stretches in the club history.

Spanning from the 2011 off season through to Round 11 in the 2013 season, Neeld coached 33 games for Melbourne, managing just a winning percentage of 15 per cent with a 5-28 record.

Neeld’s 2013 season unravelled almost immediately, with the Demons winning just once from their first 11 games in 2013, losing by an average margin of 77 points, including a 148-point demolition at the hands of Essendon.

Neeld was eventually let go by the club off the back of an 83-point loss to Collingwood mid-year, where CEO Peter Jackson cleaned house sacking both Neeld and President Don McLardy in the same week.

The former coach gave insight to his time with the Dees on This is Your Journey – thanks to Tobin Brothers revealing the lessons he learnt from the experience and the reality behind the decision.

Edmund: “The new CEO is Peter Jackson, a name our listeners know very well, a few weeks later meets with the AFL to ask for priority picks and an assistance package to help. President Don McLardy resigns late the day that he did, and you get a call a few days after that, from Peter at 7:55 in the morning which I imagine wasn’t standard procedure, and when the phone rings I imagine your fearing the worse at that point.”

Neeld: “I knew, absolutely.”

Edmund: “Why did you know? Was there something in the build up? Was it reaching an inevitable phase?”

Neeld: “I think we actually got over what I thought was inevitable when Peter came in, I didn’t have to many conversations with Peter, so I knew.”

Edmund: “He was cleaning house.”

Neeld: “Absolutely.”

Edmund: “Never a good sign if you can’t get a meeting with the new CEO I suppose.”

Neeld: “Probably not, now I sit in that same seat.”

Edmund: “Tell me this, I often find myself wondering this, you front up to the farewell press conference and not all of you guys as former AFL coaches have done that or do that, you maintain your dignity, I was going back through he transcript of it you take ownership of your own portion of it, you don’t appear to blame anyone else, was there a temptation just to scream it out, like to explain it to justify it, your entire body must have been wanting to do that in that moment, surely you would have been human nature wouldn’t it?”

Neeld: “We're all different, I did me.”

Edmund: “I don’t even think you went close to even saying anything that could have been constituted as an excuse and yet as we’ve just articulated over the course of the last 40 minutes, you had about as long as my arm excuses to roll out.”

Neeld: “That was just me, being an AFL head coach is a privilege and yes it didn’t last as long as what I planned or what I wanted to do. It was a phenomenal experience and the way that my mind works and the way that I have been brought up was to be thankful for the opportunities that came your way, and even deep down I knew having done that, that in the future I would be in positions because of that and the learnings that came out of that, and I like working with honest respectful people, so if I like that in other people I feel that that’s the way I want to be.”

Edmund: “So no regrets is an age-old cliché but is it the reality for you with the coaching tenure and how it played out?”

Neeld: “Not regretting being an AFL coach, I’ve had 13 years of life and work experience since then, we all have if you’ve been around that long and I’ve done different things, being overseas and studied come back here and studied, done an MBA, now worked as a CEO for 7 years, coach, community. You can’t transport yourself back in time, we all would like to do that I’m sure with certain aspects, but the best thing that I can do is all those learnings mixed with the last 13 years, put that into practice in my day job. I’m coaching a community footy club and I see them three or four times a week, put it into practice there and see how we go. They’re the types of characteristics that I like to be around so if I’m going to say that, then I need to live my life like that.”

Edmund: “What a journey it was, some great playing memories and it might just sit among one of the more hectic coaching stints that the game has seen for a long, long, time and of course a lot of it out of your control.”

Neeld spoke about his career as a player, coach and much more on this week’s episode.

Listen to the rest of the chat below.