Former Melbourne assistant coach Brendan McCartney says honesty can help club rebound in 2020

Brendan McCartney has urged Melbourne players to get honest with each other, believing the club has enough talent to rebound from a disastrous 2019 campaign.

Brendan McCartney embraces Christian Petracca after a Melbourne win. Picture: Adam Trafford/AFL Media/Getty Images.

Ex-Melbourne assistant Brendan McCartney says the Demons need to face home truths to overcome their disastrous season.

The Demons came within one win of a preliminary final in 2018, but unravelled last season, winning just five games and finishing second last.

McCartney is confident the “special group” can bounce back — provided they can face some home truths.

“They’re good boys, they’re good to work with, it’s a young coaching group but they’re fantastic, they work hard, they’ve got great relationships with the players, all the hallmarks of a fantastic program,” McCartney said on SEN radio.

“They just need a big summer of conditioning and probably need to get in a room at times and be pretty honest with each other — in the right way.”

McCartney, who was first demoted, then parted ways with Melbourne in a club shake-up, believes expectation weighed heavily on the Demons.

He said the team struggled to defeat Hawthorn in last year’s semi-final and was hampered by surgery that prevented a number of key midfielders from taking part in pre-season work.

Brendan McCartney embraces Christian Petracca after a Melbourne win. Picture: Adam Trafford/AFL Media/Getty Images.

“If we go back to the year before, this is only a personal opinion, I didn’t think we were probably going as well as people thought we were, I thought we were on our last legs against Hawthorn,” he said.

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“(If) a couple of things had have gone the other way, they might have got us late, they had their chances, then we got belted in Perth, they were red-hot at the start.”

“We had a tough summer with surgery, the midfield basically couldn’t do any competitive work … we weren’t equipped for it, we couldn’t do the work those mids needed and the physical contact.

“I think a bit of confidence went out of the group, too, and they got a bit gun-shy.

“But the foundations are there, I think it’ll come back.”