Patrick Dangerfield writes one player can’t win a premiership

THE big names sell memberships but the messiah complex has claimed sporting clubs all over the world, writes superstar recruit Patrick Dangerfield.

Geelong team photo day at Simonds Stadium, Patrick Dangerfield awaits the team photo. 3rd February 2016. Picture: Colleen Petch.

IT’S usually one of the first things you hear: “We’re going to win the flag now that you’re here.”

What do you say to that?

Smile, thank them for their comment and then move on quickly because you understand it doesn’t work like that.

One player doesn’t win premierships.

The biggest names sell memberships, they can provide hope and excitement, but they don’t guarantee success.

The messiah complex has claimed many clubs over the journey.

You look across every sport in the world, the game is sold on the game’s best players.

Kids buy memberships because of Gary Ablett, Nat Fyfe, Wayne Carey, Leigh Matthews and Gary Ablett Sr because they want to watch the best players.

Yet as good as they are it doesn’t automatically get the results everyone wants. Take Ablett Sr, he was amazing for Geelong but it was never enough to win a Grand Final.

The influx of recruits at a number of clubs has generated this type of response for supporters.

My return home from Adelaide, Adam Treloar to Collingwood, Harley Bennell to Fremantle and Charlie Dixon to Port.

There is an expectation that their recruitment will make a significant difference and we all know the microscope will be on our every move.

But the oldest cliche in the book — a champion team always beats a team of champions — is still as pertinent today as it was 100 years ago.

Patrick Dangerfield joins his new Geelong teammates for the team photo. Picture: Colleen Petch

Before the International Rules Series in 2014, our coach Alastair Clarkson sent around a DVD to every player in the Australian team.

It was a documentary about the US basketball’s “Dream Team” when they first came together in 1992 before the Barcelona Olympics.

While they went on to win the gold medal easily, the documentary showed how when they first came together they played really poorly.

We’re talking some of the best players in NBA history with a starting line-up including Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird.

This documentary focuses on a scrimmage game they had with a university side made up of the best college kids going around. (Some would later turn out to be superstars like Grant Hill and Penny Hardaway.)

The Dream Team was terrible. They were behind at halftime and ended up losing the game by eight points.

There is an unhealthy obsession with the stars but it’s not going to change any time soon.

Clarko’s point was that we were gathering the best players in the competition together to represent Australia but that alone would not get the result we were looking for.

Every player had to a find a role within the team and then execute it as a unit.

Just like the Dream Team found a way after the early issues, taking the Olympic gold with an average winning margin of 43.8 points.

Basketball is an interesting case study because it’s small enough that a star player can start a play and finish it.

How often in footy does a play start with the team’s best player and then end with him? It doesn’t happen.

So while it may be the best player who wins the game or kicks the goal, the play might have started in the back pocket with an incredible spoiling effort to beat two forwards or a bump or a shepherd.

There is an unhealthy obsession with the stars but it’s not going to change any time soon.

Sometimes for a brief moment the spotlight might flick over to someone else like when Aussie Matthew Dellavedova was the toast of the NBA finals for a couple of games.

He was doing some incredible defending, which was his role — he wasn’t doing anything special but America fell in love for him for those games.

But it was only for a glimpse and then they were back on LeBron.

Successful Internationals Rules coach Alastair Clarkson.

The term “role player” is misunderstood in the AFL. People think that when the term is used that the players mustn’t be any good.

It’s crazy because these players are the most important players at your club.

Look at Hawthorn’s Liam Shiels.

He doesn’t get spoken about but Luke Hodge, Sam Mitchell and the Hawks’ other stars couldn’t do what they do without the work of Shiels.

And Ben Stratton finished sixth in Hawthorn’s best-and-fairest in a premiership year, but no one talks about him.

At Adelaide, Rory Laird was the man.

While the public started to get wind of his abilities late in the year, internally he’s universally admired and crucial to the Crows scoring by his stopping or blocking, which starts up chains of attack.

When I think about Sydney, the name Nick Smith is the first that pops into mind because the job he does every week without fanfare is so important to the outcome of the game.

This year at Geelong, Cam Guthrie could be that man.

With the injury to Jackson Thurlow, the experts are tipping he’ll probably have to spend more time in defence. Cam is such a good inside midfielder but should the team need him to play another role, he wouldn’t hesitate.

While these players won’t attract the headlines or find themselves on billboards, what they do is something far more important — they get you to the first week of October.