North Melbourne’s current team is ominously like the 1996 premiers
THE current North Melbourne team is displaying the determination and talent that was a hallmark of the club’s breakthrough premiership 20 years ago.
North Melb
Don't miss out on the headlines from North Melb. Followed categories will be added to My News.
DON’T muck with the Duck.
That definitive statement about Wayne Carey’s decade of dominance — sanitised for a family audience — is why North Melbourne’s 1996-1999 premiership teams stand alone.
Don’t compare them or critique them or try to draw parallels with modern North Melbourne teams.
And yet ...
Exactly 20 years on from North Melbourne’s breakthrough premiership, a Kangaroos outfit is again shooting for the stars.
Just like that 1996 team which fell short in successive preliminary finals before finally beating Sydney to the premiership, Brad Scott’s side has experienced identical finals heartache.
Just like Denis Pagan’s premiers — spearheaded by key forwards Carey, Corey McKernan, Craig Sholl and Darren Crocker — this bunch of Roos have an awesome array of forward line talent.
And just like that team 20 years ago, the Roos are flying under the radar as a host of high-profile premiership contenders jostle in this premiership marathon.
North Melbourne football director Glenn Archer hopes this Roos outfit will go 7-0 against St Kilda and continue a flawless 2016 campaign.
He knows the challenges and contenders that lie ahead.
And yet ...
“I was only talking about that today, that it has the same feeling as 20 years ago, losing those prelims and doing the apprenticeship through the finals then cracking it in 1996. Hopefully this side can replicate that,’’ says Archer, judged the club’s Shinboner of the Century.
“It is still early and there is so much footy to be played, but we are on the right track. The biggest change this year has been the constant pressure for four quarters. They are just stifling teams.”
Archer is aware there are sexier teams out there who get more adulation than the Roos, but says it has been thus for 20 years.
Water off a Duck’s back, so to speak.
I reckon you need 90 per cent of your team to be selfless and that’s what we have got at North, guys who play for the team.
- Glenn Archer
The North Melbourne gang will get back together in July for a 20-year reunion, where of course Carey will again hold court.
But Archer says Carey’s reputation belies a certain selflessness that is the hallmark of the 1996 and 2016 forward lines.
“Obviously Wayne stood above every one but the one thing with that forward line was that everyone knew their role and played it.
“We didn’t have selfish players. Guys knew when to lead and when to dummy lead and then get out of the way, which was generally for Wayne.
“But I reckon you need 90 per cent of your team to be selfless and that’s what we have got at North, guys who play for the team.
“We have had some luck. We came up against the Suns and they had five players out. We came up against the Dogs and they had four out.
“But this group has been together long enough to be very predictable to each other.”
Twenty years on, Pagan says North Melbourne is ticking the only box that is required in home-and-away footy.
“The only thing that matters in footy is the scoreboard. North are 6-0,’’ he says.
“In footy if you are a coach or a team or a player it’s all about winning.
“You get more Ws than Ls you have a chance. If you get too many Ls you get the Tijuana Brass.
“They have already beaten Adelaide. The Dogs had injuries but they beat them.
“The only thing that matters is how many points you are on at the end of the season.
“Ron Casey said to me before the 1996 Grand Final when we were feeling the pressure, ‘Denis, if you keep finishing top four your turn will come sooner or later’.
“Four weeks later we were premiers. You just keep knocking on the door.”
Remarkably, that 1996 side thrived despite the hovering threat of merger with Fitzroy in 1996, a prospect announced 20 years ago this week.
Premiership ruck/forward Corey McKernan remembers holding a press conference to discuss the club’s future with Carey, yet still not being diverted from the premiership tilt.
It is safe to say Pagan never worried about Champion Data’s premiership quadrant when he was a senior coach.
As he says of the Roos forward line: “Just look at Drew Petrie, Ben Brown and Jarrad Waite. Under pressure you get it deep and long and give them a chance.
“Every September it’s contested ball, quick ball movement, deep entries, get front and centre. Then when it’s your turn you defend like there is no tomorrow.
“That is not a recipe that needs to be tinkered with.”
Champion Data validates that winning approach, even if it still has queries about North Melbourne’s defensive methods.
The stats say the Roos generate a goal from 31.9 per cent of inside 50s — first in the comp.
They also move the ball well and are ranked sixth from turnover scores and fourth from stoppages — a nice blend of attacking methods.
Ron Casey said to me before the 1996 Grand Final, ‘Denis, if you keep finishing top four your turn will come sooner or later’.
- Denis Pagan
The issue is defending, the Roos ranked 16th from conceding scores from stoppages before an excellent defensive effort against the Dogs last week.
McKernan, another believer on the Roos’ bandwagon this year, believes the Roos back six can hold up.
“Having a big defender like Mick Martyn, you could rely on him to play on the big forwards,” says McKernan.
(Or “you need a gorilla to play on a gorilla,’’ as Pagan said again this week).
“Last year in Round 1 Taylor Walker took 15 marks and kicked 6.5. This year Robbie Tarrant has developed into a player who can stand a power forward and kept him really quiet.
“It’s little signs like that that show how they have improved.”
McKernan believes those little intangibles not measured on the stats sheet give the Roos a chance to again be premiers this year.
“Jack Ziebell and Wellsy (Daniel Wells) have stood up at different times to win games and that’s what a good team does.
“They have the right balance. There is the back-end talent with Drew (Petrie), Nick Dal Santo, Boomer (Harvey) and Jarrad Waite.
“But then they have the kids coming on. My favourite is Jack Ziebell. If you talk about guys who could have played in the 1990s, Denis wouldn’t have minded a young Jack Ziebell in our team.”
Originally published as North Melbourne’s current team is ominously like the 1996 premiers
The Bunbury oxymoron: An unmemorable piece of history
For North, it was the win they had to have. For the Eagles, it was the one that got away. But for the neutrals, it was an unmemorable day to kickstart North’s WA venture.
No ‘vendetta’, ‘life ban’: Hood reveals Cornes, North crisis talks
North Melbourne president Sonja Hood has revealed the club is yet to decide whether to revoke its Kane Cornes ban after holding talks with Channel 7 bosses.