North Melbourne coach Rhyce Shaw opens up on hub life, and what the Roos must do to snap losing streak
Marquees, big screen TVs and projectors – North Melbourne coach Rhyce Shaw tells Mark Robinson the club’s hub facility is “pretty cool” and reminds him of being trackside at the races.
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The football world is looking at North Melbourne and doesn’t know what it is looking at.
A team that found its soul against Greater Western Sydney in Round 2 and then lost it over three weeks.
A lack of stars in a team struggling to find its identity.
A new coach whose honeymoon is over.
Rhyce Shaw laughed at that last offering.
Such is the intensity of senior coaching, he says, the honeymoon is over after just one game in the role.
“It certainly was,’’ Shaw said. “Bloody oath it was.’’
The Kangas aren’t being death-ridden in this topsy-turvy season – not yet, anyhow – but questions are now being asked.
“To be honest, I don’t care what other people say,” Shaw said.
“I’m true to myself and I do the right thing by my players, my coaches and my footy club, so I don’t read too much into that stuff. That doesn’t worry me.
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“What we stand for is another thing. I reckon we stand for something really strong, but at the moment the consistency with that is not there.
“It’s a little bit of minute to minute with us, but I’m confident we can find our form and get back on track and really quickly.”
After three successive losses since the Giants win, Saturday’s test is enormous.
They play their biggest rival Essendon at Metricon Stadium and after a tumultuous week, and what really has been a tumultuous and unexpected three weeks, Shaw is hankering for the first bounce.
“We’re not shying way from that, and we haven’t shied away from that from the day we got up here,’’ he said.
“I’m excited about what we can do. If we can put out our best performance, the North Melbourne brand of footy, put the overalls on and work hard at the contest and give ourselves an opportunity outside the contest … yeah, I’m looking forward to it.”
HEADING INTO HUB LIFE
It’s been a scrambling week for Shaw.
He didn’t get to his players until Tuesday morning after last Saturday’s savage loss to the Bulldogs.
The team did recovery on Sunday and then the players packed their bags.
They flew to the Gold Coast on Monday morning, settled into their new digs at the Mercure Hotel on Monday afternoon and night, and the review of the game was held on Tuesday morning.
It wasn’t normal planning, but not much is normal these days.
The Kangas share the Mercure with Carlton and the Bulldogs.
Those two teams have their football headquarters in the plush reception centres inside.
The Kangaroos are in two marquees set up on the tennis courts outside.
“It’s like the Birdcage at Flemington, it’s pretty cool,’’ Shaw said.
They had four TVs installed and a massive projector.
Shaw split the group into three smaller, random groups, and they watched the first quarter of the Bulldogs game.
Assistant coach Heath Scotland said on Tuesday there were “confronting conversations today, as a group and individually’’.
Shaw said he was honest and blunt, as he is every week, but hinted this week was different.
The score at quarter-time was the Bulldogs 2.2 to North’s 1.2, but Shaw had seen enough.
“I wanted them to own what was going on,’’ Shaw said.
“By that, I meant all of us. We have to own it, the coaches and the players, we have to own what we’re producing.
“All I wanted them to do was pick up on the stuff we stand for and we weren’t doing.
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“It’s not about the scores. As a playing group we want to play the way we want to play all the time.
“When we’re not doing that, we get smashed. Usually when we do it, the scoreboard takes care of itself.
“Our boys, hopefully after Tuesday, got a greater understanding of what we have to do.’’
Shaw wouldn’t elaborate on exactly what that is.
“I’m not going to say effort, I’m going to say work and work really hard. The Bulldogs showed us up in that area,’’ he said.
“I’ve been blatantly honest, we’ve been pretty disappointing in the way we’ve been going.
“Against St Kilda (Round 1) we didn’t get going until the third quarter and came home like a train and we won.
“Then we played an outstanding game against GWS.
“Then we play a quarter of footy against the Swans and get done. Then play 20 minutes against the Hawks and get done by four points.
“Against the Doggies, they smashed us. We were coming off a six-day break, they were coming off a 10-day break, I made a poor decision in playing Cunners (Ben Cunnington) and then we got a couple of injuries … it was a disaster.
“We really haven’t played the right footy since GWS so we deserve the losses.
“We’re still finding out as a footy club what it actually takes to play at the best standard all the time.
“You actually have to put in the effort all the time to get the result you want. It’s not much more basic than that.’’
A NUMBERS GAME
Statistics can overwhelm footy.
Some numbers can explain the game, others can leave you dumbfounded.
North Melbourne this year is the No. 1 clearance team in the competition.
But North Melbourne this year is also ranked 18th for scores against from clearance.
In a nutshell, when the opposition wins the ball at the source, the Kangaroos are exposed defensively – for speed and for work rate.
It’s probably what Shaw means when he says it’s time to don the overalls.
This is not a five-game trend, either. The Kangaroos were ranked 17th in all of 2019.
“It’s an area we’re aware of and we want to do something about,’’ Shaw said.
“I think over the past couple of years we’ve been exposed by pretty good sides in that area.
“We’re not working, mate, we need to understand how important that transition side is … because it is an area of concern.’’
Clearly, there’s a major difference between pressure and work rate.
North Melbourne, after all, is the No. 1 ranked pressure team in the competition.
“Pressure comes in the contest, we do that well,’’ Shaw said.
“It’s the next phase. I think coming up here and going through the review and we understand what it looks like. I’m really confident we can turn it around.’’
There are team failings and individual failings.
Simply, players are out of form.
Cameron Zurhaar, Shaun Higgins, Jared Polec and Ben Brown come to mind.
And Cunnington and Jack Ziebell are injured and out this week.
Brown is wearing some flak. He’s at his best when his midfield teammates are in space and can deliver the ball quickly.
But when that’s not happening and he’s crowded there’s too much throwing the arms in the air looking for free kicks.
Midfielder Aaron Hall is coasting.
He wants the easy ball forward of the contests so he can razzle dazzle, a mindset which is part of the problem of why the Kangas are 18th for scores against.
Defender Marley Williams has been axed. He is rated a poor kick.
The other rebounder, Jasper Pittard, is rated a below-average kick. Josh Walker is a terrific stopper but also is rated a poor kick.
There are other components than being average users of the ball, but the fact is North Melbourne is ranked 14th for moving the ball from defensive 50 to forward 50.
Young bloke Kyron Hayden is rated a poor kick, Ziebell and Cunnington are rated poor, Polec is below average, as is Trent Dumont. It is a massive issue.
The positives are the performances of ruckman Todd Goldstein and emerging midfielder, 22-year-old Jy Simpkin.
And Luke McDonald might have finally found his position.
He tagged Marcus Bontempelli last week for a good result and is likely to get a job on either Dylan Shiel or Zach Merrett on Saturday night. Still, he is rated a below-average kick.
Shaw wouldn’t individualise the blame.
“We’ve got to own it as a group,’’ he said.
“I have spoken to the group about what they’re producing and what it looks like.
“Obviously there are individuals that aren’t going great at the moment, but I’m confident in a quick turnaround for those players as well.
“They are working hard. I’m pleased how they’ve gone about it. It isn’t through a lack of effort during the week. We just have to produce it as a team.’’
FACING AN OLD FOE
The backdrop to Saturday night’s game is the rivalry with Essendon.
Shaw picked a fight with the Bombers a couple of weeks back and, once again, refused to call the opposition by their name at his press conference on Friday.
“I’ve embraced that rivalry,’’ he said.
“It will be mentioned this week, it won’t be the sole focus, but it will be mentioned.’’
He witnessed what the Bombers did to Collingwood last weekend.
Essendon people say it was their best pressure performance in recent memory.
“I rate them as a really good side,’’ Shaw said.
“I think they’re slipping under the radar a little bit, but they certainly won’t with us this week.
“They’re working hard, they’ve changed their game a little bit, which makes sense, and, yeah, I’m looking forward to it.’’
It is expected to be wet on Saturday night and, Shaw says, there’s an urgency for his team to play “the right way’’.
“The game is 90 per cent mental,’’ he said.
“Everyone is doing the same stuff physically. It’s the teams who are absolutely primed to go and it’s the teams who do it consistently who ultimately get to the pointy end of the season. We’ve got to that. We’ve got to be consistent.’’
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