Nathan Buckley to avoid watching AFL grand final as pain of GWS loss sinks in
The pain of preliminary finals defeat is still sinking in for Nathan Buckley. The Pies coach on avoiding the big one this weekend — and some likely changes at Collingwood next season.
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Nathan Buckley is expecting the hurt of Collingwood’s finals exit to intensify in coming days as he shields himself from the biggest match on the footy calendar.
Buckley will avoid this weekend’s AFL Grand Final, saying the pain of the Pies’ defeat and that wasted opportunity is too raw for him to tune in.
The Collingwood coach acknowledged preliminary finalist GWS was harder for longer than his team in Saturday’s shock win at the MCG, but that the loss will burn deeply for some time yet.
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As GWS prepares to tackle Richmond for the premiership, the Pies are trying to come to terms with how they slipped up after heading into Saturday’s prelim an overwhelming favourite.
And that is proving tough for Buckley, who is trying to see the positives despite his team’s season thudding to a halt.
“I will avoid the grand final,” he said.
“I will not be going anywhere near it for the next three or four days.
“Adam Simpson actually came up (at the Brownlow) and asked me ‘Are you out of the cave yet?’
“I understood the question, and I’ll probably understand it more over the next couple of days. I know what he’s talking about because I reckon I was in the cave a bit straight after the grand final (last year).
“I’m not there now, I’ve sort of been able to lift my head up, see the wood from the trees so to speak, but I don’t think that’s going to be as easy in the next three or four days and I don’t intend to rub my own nose in it.”
Buckley said the Pies would today wind up their reviews and would enjoy a “relaxed” day sharing each other’s company. But there is an overriding sense his men missed a big opportunity.
“It was definitely a waste,” he told SEN.
“It’s a huge waste. There’s so much investment, work, passion, care and energy that goes into a campaign.
“In the end you either earn it or you don’t. We’d done enough in preparation to earn it ... I think in many ways our season will stack up against the year before but ultimately we were one win worse off.
“The wasted year, on one measure you should support that given we were in pretty good shape coming into this part of the season compared to last year to be honest — we were probably in better shape, we just didn’t execute on preliminary final night the way that we did last year with what we had available.
“It was a wasted opportunity but there is plenty of optimism in what we are doing, in what we’ve built.”
The Pies will farewell some players — Daniel Wells has already announced his retirement — but the coach is confident of retaining in-demand forward Jamie Elliott.
“No I don’t think it’ll be a battle (to keep him),” Buckley told SEN.
“I know that Billy loves this place, I know that he feels a real strong connection to it ... I know that this place feels like family to him.
“We have to consider his needs from a financial perspective but I think he’s also in a position now where he can really back himself, so I think that he’ll do that.”
Buckley said he wasn’t too worried about the long-term future of star ruckman Brodie Grundy just yet, saying the South Australian was contracted for another season.
But there looks certain to be a change in the coaching box, with highly-rated assistant Justin Longmuir firming to win the vacant Fremantle job.
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“Selfishly, no (I hope he doesn’t get it),” Buckley said.
“He’s been a really key part of a really strong coaching group off field. But you just love to see good people get great opportunities.
“I’m sure that’ll come out in the wash in the next week or so. I did think that that went quite quiet over the last couple of weeks, which is generally a good sign for the bloke that’s still involved in finals.
“We’ll know more about that I suppose as Fremantle conclude their process over the next week or so.”
Originally published as Nathan Buckley to avoid watching AFL grand final as pain of GWS loss sinks in
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