Chris McDermott: Why Adelaide Crows must win 2018 AFL premiership
FORMER Adelaide Crows captain Chris McDermott describes why the 2017 grand finalists must climb the final step this season.
Chris McDermott
Don't miss out on the headlines from Chris McDermott. Followed categories will be added to My News.
SPLIT Enz had a hit with History Never Repeats. Great song, but not true.
Sometimes it does — but it mustn’t for the Adelaide Football Club.
Their methodical climb up the AFL ladder to premiership glory must be completed this year.
Lessons from the past learned and corrections for the future made.
Opportunities don’t come around often enough to let one slip.
The Crows of 1993 did and the agony of that preliminary final loss to Essendon still stings 25 years later.
I cant help but think of the similarities between that loss in 1993 and the Grand Final defeat last season.
In 1993, of course, Adelaide led the Bombers by a massive 42 points at half-time. The scoreboard read 12.12 to 6.6 — 24 scoring shots to 12.
But the Bombers came from nowhere to get home by 11 points, kicking 11 goals to the Crows’ two in the second half.
Seven days later they would blitz Carlton by 44 points to be, once again, champions of the AFL.
That hurt.
I lost a few grand finals in my day. At Glenelg, Port Adelaide got us in 1981. Norwood were too good in 1982. North Adelaide got some revenge in 1987 and the Magpies did us again in 1988 and 1990, the season before the Crows entered the AFL.
I haven’t watched any of those games again.
Not surprisingly, I’ve never been enticed to watch the 1993 preliminary final again, either.
Of all my losses in big games that one probably hurt the most.
It became more painful 12 months later when the Crows failed to even make the top eight, let alone get a chance to right the wrongs in September.
From the brink of a Grand Final to no finals at all.
The ramifications were severe. A 1994 season where we thought a premiership was almost our right ended in absolute despair. Coach Graham Cornes was relieved of his duties and one mistake led to another with the appointment of Robert Shaw.
We all know how that went.
Even if a disastrous follow-up to Adelaide’s first grand final appearance since 1998 unfolds this year, the club must not make the same mistakes again.
The Crows are a smarter organisation than 25 years ago and the current group must believe they can go one step further. Not just think they can — but know they can.
Coach Don Pyke will continue to steer them in his cool, calm and calculated manner. Captain Taylor Walker must continue his strong supporting role.
The relationship between coach and captain disintegrated beyond repair in the wake of that preliminary final loss in 1993 and the fallout was catastrophic.
Graham and I were two very strong-minded individuals, with two very different opinions on how to manage and treat the playing group.
Divided we fell and the longer the season went the more divided we grew.
It reached crisis point in Round 14 against St Kilda at Waverley Park.
It was a pivotal game. A game we had to win after losing four of our previous six matches.
In reality our collapse was already underway but all hope had not been lost.
Until now.
Our disagreement in front of the playing group was poor judgement by both of us but as captain I should have known better and kept my mouth shut.
I didn’t.
The cavern between many of the players and the coach grew wider.
We would lose five of the next six games and it was season — and premiership dream — over.
Oh, to have that time again.
Only seven of the team from that 1993 prelim loss survived to get another chance in 1997.
That defeat ultimately fractured one of the great groups of players to ever assemble under the one roof.
The game was never the same for many of us after that.
Jake Lever and Charlie Cameron are the only casualties from 2017 but both departed on their terms.
Most have stayed put and held firm, desperate to right the wrongs from that last Saturday in September.
The damage was far greater in 1993.
Patience for one poor performance was lost, and after a brief strong start to the 1994 season it fell apart and could not be saved.
The current group of players at West Lakes must forget about righting the wrongs and focus on winning what comes.
The 2018 season, for Adelaide, is about winning the AFL premiership in the style they can and with the players they have.
It is not about making amends for 2017.
You can never undo what has been done.
Second chances rarely pay off for AFL coaches
History suggests strongly that if you miss out on a premiership at your first try as a coach, you should not get another chance — unless you’re Mick Malthouse or Malcolm Blight, writes Chris McDermott.
When two tribes go to war
It was the game that stopped a state — the first Showdown between the Crows and Power on April 20, 1997. Chris McDermott shares his memories for Part 1 of The Greatest Showdowns series.