by Dutchy » Wed Aug 08, 2012 2:16 pm
Great article, nails it IMO...
Did you hear the one about the Power and crying comedian?
by: Patrick Smith
From: The Australian
PORT Adelaide lost its most important man yesterday. And it wasn't coach Matthew Primus. It was someone called Brett Duncanson. Apparently he has been chairman for nearly four years.
Duncanson headed a news conference at which he spoke for what must have been nearly a day, interrupted only by bouts of weeping. Duncanson has stood down after leading - no, that is an exaggeration, so we'll change that to heading - the club.
In which time Port has finished 10th, 10th, 16th and presently sits on five wins and in 14th place. The club is on more financial drip feeds than Greece, has a diminishing supporter base and officials call two men and a dog a sellout crowd.
Duncanson's board had reappointed Mark Williams for two years in June 2009 and then sacked him in July 2010. The payout to the former premiership coach may have been as much as $1 million. The same board then appointed Primus and sacked him on the weekend. It is not known whether the AFL had a hand in Duncanson's resignation but surely if he had not stepped down then a push in the back was heading his way. Port is presently in the middle of a $9m subsidy handout from the AFL.
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Chief executive Keith Thomas, whose national comedy tour, Boom Boom, starts following round 23, took over the media conference after Duncanson fell apart when he was about to thank his family. Thomas declared the club was not in crisis. Sorry, the tour started yesterday. Boom boom.
When Thomas had finished his skit and was about to take questions, Duncanson, weeping no more, took over to finally thank his family which included his daughter who is a psychiatrist. She works from home.
This slice of life at Port Adelaide exposed a club at its most dysfunctional. Thomas said the club had decided to end the career of Primus early because it wanted to go into the marketplace. Two points: retaining Primus until round 23 and sussing out coaching options are not mutually exclusive. And it is not as though any other club will be chasing a coach between now and next season unless Brett Ratten and Carlton completely botch their final month of football for the year.
How Duncanson, a president, came to be the centre of attention the day a coach was cut is indicative of a club with a blind spot to the issues that struck it down. Nobody was even slightly interested in Duncanson or who helped him or who encouraged him or how critical was the love of his family.
Once he said he would stand down to give the board "clear air", public interest had peaked. The rest of his teary monologue were emotions best left to be shared in private. It was self-indulgence of squirm in-your-chair proportions. But it did suggest Port Adelaide was some sort of wacky club that rated officials more importantly than coaches and players.
Duncanson toted achievements accomplished under his chairmanship but that's for the annual report. Unless he was to explain how the club could be so bereft of self-respect on the ground and away from it then he was wasting everybody's time.
This is a tough assessment of Duncanson, a man who has given much to football and Port Adelaide. He has given his time generously and always worked in what he thought were the best interests of the club. But under his chairmanship Port has made two whopping bad errors - Williams and Primus.
The decision to sack Williams was supposed to halt the malaise that had overtaken the playing list. Williams was deemed to be the cause. Yet Primus could fare no better and the board once more assessed the coach as the heart of the problem. So, two coaches and a lot of money later, Port still has not identified the reason for its incompetence.
Thomas explained - when he got a chance - that the club had been under private review for most of the year. The results would be kept in-house but it is believed it recommended Primus be kept on as coach.
The bigger issues were seen to be in the football department, resources and general football knowledge.
Unless the review recommends an extensive clean-out of staff - football and administrative - then it is not worth the time and effort to produce it.
The demise of Williams and Primus shows it is not about the quality of the coaching but rather decrepitude endemic to the club culture.
If none of this is attempted, or is but fails to identify the core problems, then the AFL will have no alternative but to step in.
It has two new clubs in Gold Coast and GWS that will struggle to establish themselves for as many as five years and swallow up AFL funding in the meantime.
It cannot have a club not winning, not earning money and not drawing crowds or interest.
Port will try once more with yet another new coach. If it cannot turn itself into a functioning and respected AFL club it might not be around after the AFL's present broadcast deal expires. Now that would be something to weep over.
