The Tackle: Mark Robinson reviews 2024 AFL premiership coach Chris Fagan

Leigh Matthews says history only remembers what happens on grand final day – so now Chris Fagan will get the recognition he deserves. MARK ROBINSON reviews the 2024 premiership legacy.

Of the millions of moments experienced in the aftermath of Brisbane’s premiership win, the embrace of Chris Fagan and Leigh Matthews at the final siren will stand the test of time.

What an unlikely pairing brought together through football.

One, a stone cold killer, and perhaps the best player of all time, who at 72 years old has softened with age.

And the other, a 63-year-old man from the wilds of west Tasmania, who wasn’t good enough to make the big league and who is widely known as having a heart of gold.

In that moment, Fagan’s chin quivered because of the sincerity of the embrace and Matthews’ wonderful words.

In the Lions rooms, with celebratory beer in hand, Matthews revealed what he said to his great friend.

“I said to him before the game, ‘You’re a premiership coach and they’ve got to prove whether they’re a premiership team’. After the game, I said, ‘You’re a premiership coach and you’ve coached a premiership team’. That’s all.”

In other words, Matthew, a board member at the Lions, already held Fagan, the coach since 2017, in the highest esteem.

“You can be a premiership coach without actually winning premiership,” Matthews said.

“I think he’s a premiership coach and it just happened today he became one, but it doesn’t mean he wasn’t before that.”

Brisbane coach Chris Fagan celebrates with Lachie Neale. Picture: Phil Hillyard

The two hardly knew each other before Fagan was recruited as senior coach by chief executive Greg Swann, but the three of them have become great mates.

A weekly dinner, with wives in tow, became the norm. It was a kind of Dad’s Army on the town, chewing the fat about the Lions, the competition, and the world’s problems.

“Leigh likes steak or ribs. I vary. Leigh’s very much a creature of habit,” Fagan once said of the dinners.

Swann agreed: “Leigh has a steak, he always has a steak. Wherever we go, he has a steak. Fages mixes it up, Leigh doesn’t mix it up.”

On Saturday, Matthews reflected on his friendship with Fagan. “He coaches the Lions and I’m on the board but we’ve become good friends and I’ve got a lot of admiration for him. So, yeah, I’m so pleased for him,” he said.

“I read the article in the Herald Sun, the man from nowhere, it’s an interesting starting point to know he didn’t play AFL, and that he played in Tassie, but he just made his way up, starting with Neale Daniher at Melbourne, then obviously at Hawthorn, then he got his chance at the Brisbane Lions.

“He’s always been underestimated. It’s partly because of his background.”

Leigh Matthews and Chris Fagan embrace after the 2024 AFL Grand Final

In defence of his great mate, Matthews threw shade at Fagan’s critics.

“Some people think they know how coaches think and they don’t,” he said.

Swann also rubbished the “bullshit” commentary.

“That’s got to be wrong. If you win as many games as we’ve won, played in four preliminary finals in the past five years, you can’t be tactically wrong,” he said.

“Look at our match-ups today. And all through the finals. We don’t profess to be anything that we’re not, we’re just a good footy club.”

Mathews said the post-match embrace wasn’t planned and only through circumstance – he had the honour of presenting the premiership cup – did they come together near the interchange.

“It’s not my moment, it’s his moment, and I just wanted to congratulate him,” he said.

From being the romantic to the pragmatic, Matthews, a four-time premiership player and four-time premiership coach, said the history books would forever anoint Fagan.

“Coaches have a win-loss ratio but nobody takes any notice of them,” he said.

“The only thing that lasts the decades is what happens in finals – if you coach a premiership or you didn’t coach a premiership.

“In 40 years’ time, it’s only about what happened on grand final day, everything else gets forgotten.”

Lions coach Chris Fagan with CEO Greg Swann after the grand final. Picture: Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images

Another of Fagan’s close friends, Alastair Clarkson, was in the rooms. He, too, had a beer in hand and waited amid the pandemonium to embrace his “best mate for a decade”.

Clarkson more than anyone, perhaps other than Fagan’s wife Ursula, would understand the emotional impact of the two-year-long Hawks racism scandal, and how difficult it was – is – to compartmentalise it.

“That’s life, it challenges you,” Clarkson said. “It just shows if you continue to believe in yourself and believe in the people around you, and put trust into those who put trust in you, then you can prevail over any struggle in our life.

“That’s why I’m so pleased for him because whether it’s to do with on-field or off-field, and some people were calling for his head, I’m just so proud.”

Chris Fagan with his players. Picture: Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images

Always in times a terrific achievement, the beginnings can be ignored. Clarkson said Fagan found success at every football club, from Hobart, to Sandy Bay, Devonport, Melbourne, Hawthorn and Brisbane.

“His footy club (Brisbane) was in disarray seven or eight years ago and it’s been a really hard path, demoralising finals defeats, he’s been under scrutiny, been through a lot of adversity on and off the field, and it’s just a great story of perseverance and resilience,” Clarkson said.

“It’s a great story about his character, about where he’s come from, from Queenstown in the west coast of Tasmania, his old man Aussie was a ripper and he and Beth raised beautiful kids.

“Fages is a great footy person.

“A great footy person is to have great knowledge of the game, but it’s having great knowledge of the journey and the evolution of a club in success and failure. It’s just like life.

“Fages’ role at Hawthorn was like the director of coaching, and we just lent on each other enormously. He was my best mate for 10 years.”

Hugh McCluggage drenches coach Chris Fagan. Picture: Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images

Swann, a now premiership chief executive after three previous defeats – two at Collingwood and last year at Brisbane – said Fagan typified the Lions finals mantra.

“Our theme for the finals series was to be tough bastards because tough bastards win premierships,” he said.

He, too, has supported Fagan during these past years of accusation.

“The Hawthorn stuff is ever present for him, always hanging over him. To do what he’s done to keep focus on the team while that was happening was amazing, absolutely amazing.

“He’s just like the players – a resilient bugger. He just dusts himself off and goes again. It’s about the team, that’s what he’s always about.”

An extended contract is in the pipeworks. “We’ve been talking. It’s now a question of how long, but it will get done.”

Another familiar face in the rooms was Australian basketball legend Phil Smyth, who has been a mentor-friend since 2019.

Smyth called Fagan a “genius”.

“I don’t think people realise that,” he said.

“Just the way he’s come into footy, it’s different to other people. Normally, you get coaches around the world or here in Australia that have one or two really strong suits, and one of them is his man management, there’s no doubt about that. They love him.

“The second part is he has a great skill for the game, and the understanding of it, and that gets missed because he’s such a great guy.

“He’s that happy father, grandfather figure to look at, but he knows how to pull the right string. He’s highly competitive, he may be the smiling assassin.”

Originally published as The Tackle: Mark Robinson reviews 2024 AFL premiership coach Chris Fagan