Re: 2018 Rd 8: Post Game Passion: Carlton vs Essendon
Reply #136 –
Phillips needs to repay the faith a bit IMHO. We have supported him through 2 seasons where he was relatively injured, and unable to play football, and is now coming good. Its a bit rich to move on for more opportunity simply because hes good enough too.
In the past we were guilty of failing our players, which is why we found player retention difficult, and player attraction. It means that money talks, and thats the only way to get players.
What I hope we are doing (led by Bolton) is investing in people as individuals and really giving them all the tools to reach their best version of themselves. This means working with them to maximise their football learning, as well as teaching them life skills and perhaps helping them through opportunites for the future (setting up learning opportunities, business opportunites, investment opportunities, coaching opportunities etc). This is a bit more conducive to building an environment that players won't just jump out of, and why its imperative that even if we arent travelling well on field, that we are doing all we can to get the most out of people both on and off it.
Obviously, we cant hang onto everyone all the time, and that will mean that we eventually have to cut our ties with people, but the manner in which players have parted ways with us in the past, and the manner in which we have parted ways with players in the past, have both indicated that we are over simplifying our management of people and looking at them as commodities. to a degree this will always be true, but I think its this sort of thing that we can control and get right, that will lead to better performance at all levels of the football club.