New coach will call on experience to guide NT club in first season
MICHAEL McLEAN is fully aware of the enormous task that lies ahead as he maps out the path the Northern Territory Football Club will take in the AFL Queensland competition from next year.
McLean was appointed to the position of senior coach of the fledgling side on Thursday as Territory club football takes its first tentative steps outside its borders.
What awaits the NTFC is a competition not unlike the one where they will have sprung from; a semi-professional league of a similar standard, but with the advantages of having an AFL club, and another to come, in its vicinity, and bodies attuned to the rhythms and cycles of a competition played out during the winter.
McLean is at least familiar with Queensland football. He spent a fair portion of the 1990s in Brisbane and the Gold Coast, with the Lions and Bears, forging a successful career that saw him win two club fairest-and-bests, induction into the Brisbane/Fitzroy Hall of Fame and joining the AFL 200 club.
A stint with AFLQ club Redland in 2005, in between gigs during the Territory 'wet' season, was his only foray in coaching at club level there. The Bombers, however, were, to put it bluntly, the whipping boys of the competition. They still haven't won anything of note. But it served McLean well.
"I learned a helluva lot at Redland," he said yesterday.
"I would say it was my best year as far as learning the coaching caper goes. You learn how to maximise your performance from getting beaten by 15 to 20 goals down to six or so (goals) the next week."
In the Northern Territory, McLean helped build Nightcliff from the ground up during a five-year period from 2001, taking the Tigers to finals and grand finals but without claiming any silverware. That changed when he moved to Southern Districts with which he won his first senior premiership as coach in 2006/07.
McLean will call on this experience to guide the NTFC in its inaugural season. He promises to bring Territory-style football to Queensland without compromising his own coaching philosophies.
The list build begins in earnest early next month. Players chosen will primarily be those with a long-time association with Territory football. McLean said players are already putting their hands up.
"It's all a big unknown now but we'll rip through the joint and get blokes who are actually committed and act accordingly," he said.
"Alot of the better players in the better teams are obviously playing now so that does make it a bit hard but we want to get this unit to be super-competitve.
"There's a good vibe in the territory at the moment, now that everything's been announced. The vibe is definitely out there."
December will also see McLean's responsibilites with Southern Districts lighten somewhat, of which he has mixed feelings.
"That will start to taper off in the next few weeks," he said.
"It's pretty tough for me, to build up a core group of players having some success, so it's bit of a shame. You want to be a 'everywhere man' but you can't do that."
Of added symbolism for McLean is his being an Aboriginal man in the role as inaugural coach of the new team.
"It is significant and it's a real honour and something I'm proud of," he said.
"I'm Darwin born so it's nice to be coach of the first side that will represent the NT.
"My immediate reaction was just having a nice feeling. I'm just glad and thankful that it was done the right way and it went through the process, because it means you've earned something."
DARREN MONCRIEFF
AboriginalFootball@westnet.com.au
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Last Modified on 15/11/2008 02:57