The Gold Coast Suns changing list strategy following improved AFL performances
The Suns list strategy has changed from seeking something they don’t have, to holding all the cards and knowing what to do with them. Coach Stuart Dew details the change in mindset around their list strategy. Plus, why he never pushed the panic button and overhauled their plan amid losing streak.
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The Suns list strategy has changed from seeking something they don’t have, to holding all the cards and knowing what to do with them.
Gold Coast has brought in enormous quality through the last two national drafts.
Jack Lukosius, Izak Rankine and Ben King arrived in 2018 and Matt Rowell, Noah Anderson, Connor Budarick, Sam Flanders, Jeremy Sharp and more joined them last year.
Add to that the arrival of mature-age players including two-time premiership player Brandon Ellis, midfielder Hugh Greenwood and tall defender Sam Collins and the development of players now in their third year and beyond and the Suns are a list with more depth, balance and an age demographic that has ample time to develop together.
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“The list strategy has been about the right characters with capability,” Dew said.
“We certainly think this is a group we would love to take us forward.
“Stability is so important. The best teams have stability off the field but more importantly for this footy club we wanted stability off the field in the locker room.
“More so than ever our players talk about the fact they look around the locker room now and see teammates who have bought in.
“That is more than anything the coaching group can promote.
“We have got people in each position. It’s about how much can we develop the players and how do they progress throughout the year.
“We always look for where we need to improve our list and where potential gaps might be.
“Normally around this time of year we start to dig into those things but it’s been a bit different this year and we are all still waiting for a bit more information to drill into that.
“We are a bit unsure of what list sizes look like and what second tier looks like.
“We are cooling our jets at the moment. We will be well planned and well ready for when that information has come to hand.”
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COACHING at the elite level is cutthroat and the Suns had already axed two coaches when Stuart Dew came on board.
So with four wins and three wins coming in his first two years at the helm in 2017 and 2018 respectively, you would be forgiven for having the temptation as coach to push the panic button and throw the plan out the window in search of short-term gains.
Two things stopped Dew from doing that.
The first was how comfortable both and the board were because of the clear five-year plan Dew, football manager Jon Haines, and list manager Craig Cameron had come up with.
The salary cap needed sorting, a new game style was being implemented and the list needed work.
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Dew knew he had time. The second was the overwhelming response from the playing group who voted with their feet, with over 20 of the core group re-signing in the past 18 months.
“We knew there would be a bit of pain going forward but we wanted to have a clear picture of what winning looked like, even if the scoreboard wasn’t ticking over,” Dew said.
The club planned to be playing ‘finals like’ football by the end of 2020 but the exit of former co-captains Tom Lynch and Steven May at the end of 2018 had them wondering if it would set them back 12 months. It hasn’t.
The foundation has been set both on and off-field and Dew has been clear about the shift in expectations internally over the coming two years.
“We want to be another footy club capable of contending,” Dew said.
“That is what drives us every day. We have got our development goals within the footy club. “The more games we can get our guys playing together, it creates synergy and gives you more of a chance of winning more regularly.
“The way the players handled the COVID-19 shut down period was pleasing and shows they are making some real gains.
“When you become teams who think they can walk down the race every week and actually believe they can win, we are right in the thick of that at the moment.
“Now it’s about the pointy end of performance and that is the pleasing thing.”
EARLIER:
STUART Dew was enjoying lunch by the water with his family at the famous Sails restaurant in Noosa when he received the phone call that sealed his position as the Gold Coast Suns new head coach.
It was early October in 2017 and he was hanging on every phone call but he had no time to be caught up by it as time ticked beyond the 24 hour time frame he was told an answer would come.
“With young kids there is not much time to be preoccupied,” Dew said.
“I was on pool duty for about six hours that day throwing the kids up and down in the water so it was easy to keep busy.”
Dew had given his second and final pitch to Gold Coast CEO Mark Evans and board members Tony Cochrane, Paul Scurrah, Martin Rowland and Simon Bennett.
The man who won AFL premierships as a player with Port Adelaide and Hawthorn and while an assistant coach at Sydney decided to spend the waiting period holidaying in Noosa while they waited on a decision.
Then, mid-meal, Evans rang.
“Once I saw his name my heart started racing and I became very hopeful,” Dew said.
“Mark asked if I could get on a flight back to Queensland but I was able to tell him I was nearby and could drive down the highway.”
Dew formally accepted the three-year offer to replace Rodney Eade as coach at the Suns Carrara headquarters.
Celebrations were in order but by the time Dew and some of his new colleagues arrived in Broadbeach for dinner it was around 10.30pm with little open.
They managed to find somewhere where they could buy a couple of beers and the journey began.
Dew was the Suns third coach in seven years after inaugural coach Guy McKenna and then Eade were axed.
This was another reset and with pressure on the club to get any kind of traction on field Evans, new to the club himself, had to get it right.
Evans knew what they needed and began a detailed search to find the right person to fit the bill.
Most of those were standard character traits most coaches have but the specifically needed someone who could unite a group of players and staff and commit them to each other, to the coach and to the football club.
The coach needed to be able to set all the right processes and procedures up so the team could play a modern style of football.
Evans set up informal coffee catch ups at cafes around Australia with well over a dozen candidates.
The Suns boss already knew Dew from their time at Hawthorn and it made for a very open discussion.
Evans needed to work out where he was at in his coaching journey, what his strengths were, what he needed to develop and what support he needed.
“The thing that convinced me that he could be a chance is that in a very short time frame of meeting someone, they quickly feel like he is on their side and can generate great bonds with people,” Evans said.
Evans then ran a series of first round interviews in Melbourne and decided on a shortlist of three.
Each of the trio came to Queensland to conduct a second interview in front of the club directors and Dew impressed again, highlighting a staged development of players and showing a clear understanding of the emerging AFL market and how he would get people excited about the team and club.
Each candidate couldn’t be separated but a flood of support for Dew by references got him over the line, with every one of them saying similar things.
“We knew about his footy smarts, e knew he had a desire to improve himself and we knew he had this capacity to be a magnet to people who want to commit to a cause.
“Those things all came through strongly from almost everyone we spoke to about him.”
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