Healy on the Swans

[Matt79]

Originally posted by footyhead
That is not the Answer, the answer as I have been saying for years is that the people of Sydney need to demand a change of culture at the Swans and then that demand will be met and we will get a flag out of these ratbags.
Either that or get a real hard coach.

Gday Footyhead,

Could you please expand on your comments...what sort of things would we see if there was a change of culture at the Swans?

Thanks mate,
Matt

[Go Swannies]

Originally posted by anne
Sydney's loss on the weekend isn't the result of the press but I also think that being based in Sydney the Swans are not criticised enough and get away with sub-standard performances and efforts. If they were a Melbourne team the press (and fans) would not accept their results, questions would be asked and something would be done. What happens in Sydney? Nothing. No-one cares and so it continues. I don't believe the players care as they get paid anyway and they certainly don't stop underperforming. This is the crux of the whole problem - the Swans are based in Sydney and will never be a good team while they are in that environment.

Well South Melbourne might enjoy having its own team. Would that be the right environment?

You really think the players don't care. Then they are great actors. I watched them walk off the ground on Sunday and they didn't seem very happy.

Things were certainly done in Melbourne last year to lift disappointing team performance. If spitting on the players isn't an indication of disquiet, I can't think what is. But the Tigers didn't seem to immediately lift. Of course, long term they took on Terry Wallace. But do you really think Wallace would have got more out of the players than Roos? Obviously they didn't - or maybe they just wanted an easy boss? And Wallace didn't seem to get a lot out of the Doggies. But both teams have lifted this year - so maybe we should just change coaches every year or so?

How about Sheady? He seems tough and he may be available soon and he has coached teams to flags under the old style.

[Matt79]

Some possible detective work...

Does Footyhead go under the same Alias as Go Swannies??

They have both posted 1157 posts AND in Go Swannies profile, it lists occupation as "Travel Writer"...which surprisingly I remember not that long ago there was a discussion on here with Footyhead mentioning that he was a travel writer...hmmmm.

If I am right, Go Swannies will probably change there profession before you can all take a look at it!!

[footyhead]

Originally posted by Matt79
Gday Footyhead,

Could you please expand on your comments...what sort of things would we see if there was a change of culture at the Swans?

Thanks mate,
Matt

Well you asked for it. Sorry it is so long winded but hey that's footyhead for ya.... !!!
I was trying to find a perfect article from this years preseason by Geof Roach of the Adelaide advertiser to demonstrate the difference in scrutiny from a team like the crows to a team like the Swans.
Let me be clear, because there are a few here who try to simplify anything I say and turn it into some reactionary stance.
Footballing culture, IMHO is something that comes from within a club, but also influences the supporters and the city where that club resides.
It is like the fluid that surrounds a growing unborn child. If it is healthy so is the child.
The Swans obviously have culture problems. These stem from a number of sources. Without getting into the historical problems that carry over from the old South Melbourne Club lets just deal with the Club as it stands now.

1. The Swans do not have enough Healthy Scrutiny with enough well respected journo's and commentators writing editorial opinion articles in the big Sydney news papers pointing out to the less educated what they should be hoping for or afraid of in the recent developments of their team and it's progress. Without these serious and respected commentators breathing down the clubs neck when it screws up, or lauding them for a job well done (with insightful observation and passion for the development within the club), then the team becomes accountable to no one except the coach and (in Sydney's case) the uneducated fans. This also goes for the coach.
Right now in Melbourne, Sheedy is being put over the hot coals and has been since the preseason. He is being held accountable to his own high standards that have been achieved and lauded by the Melbourne press.
Where are the serious commentators in Sydney really putting forward an concise argument of what has happened at the Swans under Roos and making public suggestions as to what should be done??
It is only through this public home town scrutiny that the amniotic fluid of official public opinion can begin to feed back to the club and have some influence on the development of the footballing fetus as it were!
2. Most of the criticism of the Swans comes out of Melbourne and so the Swans and the supporters develop a chip on their shoulders about the fact that they are not in Melbourne!!!
The Swans are in Sydney, they always will be and they should do everything they can to slowly wean themselves away from any Melbourne identity that they have, because that is not where the cultural feed back they desperately need must come from.
The more the Swans identify with Melbourne in any way, the less appealing they are to Sydney and the harder it is to set up that cultural feed back I was talking about.
3. The Swans have been under so much financial pressure, and AFL in Sydney is so important to the league, they have set up an extremely staunch regime to administer the club. They have done a good job at building the corporate structure, but that again is something that short circuits the feed back from the club to it's hometown opinion setters. If the club is hardened to public opinion cos they know the league will back em any way, why would a self respecting journo touch em ??
It would not matter if the Swans were only getting 10-15 thousand per game, they would always exsist because they are that important to the National status and image of the AFL. So in some ways the AFL and the Swans don't need to actually do well for their own existence in sydney. because By hook or by crook they will exist there anyway, even if the AFL had to carry them. They simply add too much value!
This creates a strange kind of complacency that is proving very hard to overcome. It also means that they take a huge risk if they get a real strong opinionated hard and arrogant coach in to bring his own culture. This is what the great ones do, they turn a club upside down when the arrive. The Swans are really afraid of this cos they can't stand the idea of losing control of their safe little fool proof corporate structure that works just fine rain hail or shine, and gets universal praise every time the team makes the finals even if they are obviously flag pretenders.

What is needed is some smart Sydney Journo or Sports editor to get on the cause, check out sites like RWO and Bigfooty, do the research really check out what is said by other journo's in other states about their teams who are doing good bad and indifferent and what is said about us, and other interstate teams and then come out with a campaign to educate and stir up the public of sydney and incite them to demand a better performing team. That editor or journo needs to be committed to a good 5-10 years of story telling and persistent nagging at the club and the public before many results could be expected.
The players obviously want to do well, but the easy life style and the lack of scrutiny is destroying them. In other states football is a religion. Until it is at least a matter of public necessity in Sydney that the Swans do well, until they are made to feel intelligently humiliated every time they give a dumb home ground performance like they did on Sunday, then this team will get away with what ever they can.
Wouldn't you sit on the beach and take it easy on $250 000 a year if you could get away with it ?
Trying to win an AFL Flag is too bloody hard!

[Go Swannies]

Originally posted by Matt79
Some possible detective work...

Does Footyhead go under the same Alias as Go Swannies??

They have both posted 1157 posts AND in Go Swannies profile, it lists occupation as "Travel Writer"...which surprisingly I remember not that long ago there was a discussion on here with Footyhead mentioning that he was a travel writer...hmmmm.

If I am right, Go Swannies will probably change there profession before you can all take a look at it!!

If it's true my split personality is worrying. I don't think anyone has been more attacking than I have of FH's snide undermining of the Swans, its players, its management and most of all its coach. In fact, threads have been closed after I was accused of playing the man.

No, I think Footyhead's other moniker is Bloodsports over at BigFooty where he posts things like:

"bloodsports
Club: Swines
Posts: 1,106

Swans sad sad sad.
Same old same old for the most boring and mediocre team in the comp.
I am sure that they will find a way to get into the finals though. But lets be fair dinkum- can this team under this regime ever win the flag?
I mean they bar up every time they have a big win over a top 4 team, but then they always forget about how easily they get smashed the week after or the next time they meet that team again!!
Bloody ridiculous!"

And, yes, I think he is a Saints supporter. Good grounding for being a destructive "fan" I guess.

I, on the other hand, mainly get criticised for being too supportive of the team. I'm having a bit of a crisis of confidence here that you could think we are one and the same! And I certainly feel a need to justify myself. Yes I am a travel writer (written several hundred articles and about 15 books). Oh damn, just have a look at my website:

http://www.davidmcgonigal.com.au/

My final defence is that I have never had a subeditor or publisher claim that I can't spell or don't understand grammar and syntax. If the other side of my brain is Footyhead it's time for it to move out.

And I wrote the match report for this week. Have a look and I hope you (and anyone else) will tell me that it doesn't read as if it was written by Footyhead.

That's at:

http://redandwhiteonline.com/content.php?id=522_0_2_0_C

Cheers
David in denial (you could have accused me of being anyone else at RWO but that one hurt).

[NMWBloods]

Aren't you in the Simpsons...?

[footyhead]

Nice photo's Dave.

[Go Swannies]

Originally posted by footyhead
Nice photo's Dave.

Thanks - but the next lot will be purely digital. I drowned my film camera off Cape Horn three weeks ago. Now I'm down to a single Nikon digital. And have to decide if I buy another film camera (the quality is better but the hassle of scanning, etc may no longer be worth it).

[NMWBloods]

The photos are fabulous.

You know you can get your film processed directly onto CD-ROM.

[footyhead]

Course I should be rude considering all the nasties you said about me, but lifes too short I reckon. Whats Antarctica like?? Pretty quite I bet.
Ever been to kalipatar ?? I got as sick as a dog in the Hyamlayas and had to rush down the mountain!!!

[footyhead]

Originally posted by Go Swannies
And Wallace didn't seem to get a lot out of the Doggies.

Wallace had the Dogs playing hard and committed Footy for years, and they were pretty much always a chane when they played under him in those fist 3 or so years, which is more than can be said for Roosy @ the Swans.

[Go Swannies]

Originally posted by NMWBloods
The photos are fabulous.

You know you can get your film processed directly onto CD-ROM.

The quality isn't good enough for magazine reproduction (need at least 30 MB and if you want the cover then 60 MB).

And yes Footyhead I'll continue to attack you when I feel you are undermining the Swans. But I have to say I cursed when I saw that you had written a well considered response while I was explaining how I wasn't you. At least you could be consistently obnoxious!

Never tried to climb Kala Patar - in fact I've only been over the Everest side of Nepal once as I keep getting drawn back to Annapurna. But I did hitchhike to near base camp on the Tibetan side when Tibet first opened up. And Antarctica is infinitely rewarding. I hardly ever go anywhere twice but I've now been to Antarctica some 70 times.

[Go Swannies]

Originally posted by footyhead
Wallace had the Dogs playing hard and committed Footy for years, and they were pretty much always a chane when they played under him in those fist 3 or so years, which is more than can be said for Roosy @ the Swans.

The Doggies a chance for a flag? I don't think so. And if you mean a chance to win any game, then that is exactly what Roos has achieved (just ask Port, the Lions, the Saints). His failing is not setting up for a good run at the finals. The tragedy is that if we'd won that last quarter against the Lions in 2003 we could have knocked the Pies off in the Grand Final. Last year we were put off track by injuries then just didn't measure up against the Saints in the finals. Roos has taken us close, now he just has to get us there.

But this week, that seems a long way away.

[footyhead]

It's an illusion I tell you all the if's and maybe's of the Swans recent achievments will never be noticed in the record books.
The Swans still don't believ in themselves and that is one persons fault.

[footyhead]

Originally posted by Go Swannies
. I hardly ever go anywhere twice but I've now been to Antarctica some 70 times.

WoW