How Warragul Industrials landed Harmit Singh as senior coach
After finishing bottom last year, the Warragul Industrials tried to snare Vermont premiership coach Harmit Singh. It was a long shot and they didn’t expect to hear back. But they did. Here’s how, after a lot of work, they locked him in.
It was a long shot. They knew that.
“Mate, it was a Hail Mary,’’ Warragul Industrials football manager Nick Gooden said with a laugh.
A few months ago Gooden and his offsider Dylan Smith made a list of coaches they considered to be the best in local football.
There were five names on it. They wanted to bring one of them to Dusties, who had a wooden spoon to stir after their first season in the West Gippsland league in 2019.
Harmit Singh was near the top of their list.
While Dusties had finished on the bottom last year with two wins, Singh had finished on top, steering Vermont to its second premiership on the hop in the powerful Eastern league.
There was the contrast between the clubs: the bush battlers and the city slickers.
Neither Gooden nor Smith knew Singh, but they were aware of his achievements at another Gippy club, Morwell. In his first senior coaching role he took to the Tigers to the 2013-14 premierships.
Industrials phoned Singh and “pitched the dream’’.
“We didn’t expect to get anything back,’’ Gooden said. “But he responded to us and wanted to have a bit more of a chat, get to know the club, find out how we go about things, what our vision was. And it snowballed from there.’’
The club’s approach came at a time when Singh had been stood down in his position as Essendon Football Club’s Academies manager, one of many jobs in football affected by COVID-19. He was unsure of his future with the Bombers and there was the prospect of Dusties offering him work to go with the coaching role.
There was also appeal in taking on a club that had finished on the bottom. Singh liked the fact that it had switched leagues to play at a better standard of football. And he had a soft spot for Gippsland and its sporting scene. He accepted the Warragul Industrials job – but only after gaining a thorough understanding of the club.
Gooden said appointing Singh was a “massive coup’’ and “probably my greatest achievement in life so far’’.
“The hours that went in, from that first point of contact to him taking the position …. because he’s so thorough, he wants to know every little aspect of every part of the club, from who fills the water bottles to who locks the club at night after a game,’’ he said.
“He wants to know every role, how he can make them better, how he can make the club better. He wants to know everything about our junior feeder clubs. The information he sucked out of us was mind-boggling.’’
Singh had been focused on trying for a third consecutive premiership with Vermont and then perhaps looking for a coaching position at VFL level or interstate.
COVID-19 intervened. Unsure of his status at Essendon, he had to “consider all options’’ (for the moment he’s back working with the Bombers).
A former VFL player, Singh, 33, has four flags to show for his seven years of coaching.
After Morwell he spent two years at Northcote Park in the Northern league, achieving finals both seasons.
A grand final loss to South Croydon in 2017 preceded his two premierships with Vermont.
He believes a move to Warragul Industrials will round out his coaching.
“To try to take a team from the bottom of the ladder and build a program and build something that’s sustainable for the club … it’s definitely an exciting opportunity, and hopefully that can lead to some other coaching opportunities down the line,’’ he said.
“When I got to Morwell they were mid-table and hadn’t won for 17 years and we were able to win a couple of premierships. Vermont hadn’t had success for nine years and we were able win two there as well. I guess (Industrials) are at the other end, a group that didn’t have much success in 2019 (and the club last won a flag in 1996). But we’ve already put some things in place. Being appointed quite early in the piece has given us an opportunity to retain a lot of our list, add some players and also work with our juniors to try to set up a frontline of talent coming through. We want the club to be representative of the community.’’
Singh plans to resume playing, having last pulled on the boots at Northcote Park.
Gooden said the club was “coming from a long way back’’ and in compiling its coaching wishlist had “put some feelers out with a few guys to see where we could go’’.
Under the presidency of local businessman Dale Bainbridge and the coaching of Stevie Ryan, Dusties had crossed from the Ellinbank and District to the stronger West Gippsland in 2019 but did it tough.
Gooden said they lost about 14 seniors players, as well as a few reserves players.
“It was a number of factors …. guys not wanting to play the higher standard and the added travel, which we thought might have been a bit of a drama,’’ he said.
“But we were confident the decision would be the right thing for the club in the long-term. And that’s paid off. For 2020 we had five blokes come back straight away. Making the move to West Gippsland was a big jump, a big leap of faith, but one year down we were confident we would have been rising up the ladder this year.’’
Dusties were also in a strong position off the field after purchasing the Club Hotel in Warragul in 2018.
President Bainbridge said the work Gooden and Smith put in to secure Singh was staggering.
“I give them the full credit for it. They put themselves out there to start the conversation with Harmit and follow it through,’’ he said.
“It took a couple of months. They kept at it and here we are I guess. The day Harmit sent us text to say he was in was a pretty special day.’’
Gooden said news of Singh’s appointment had created a buzz around the club and a lot of talk in the Warragul district.
“Absolutely massive. You invest in your coaching department and football department in the hope it will pay dividends in terms of excitement and exposure and all of those sorts of things, and since we’ve got Harmit we’ve had guys wanting to come and play with us.
“So many good footballers have reached out to us wanting to play under him. It’s been amazing, probably superseded everything we thought. Hopefully the story has a fairytale ending in September next year.’’
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Originally published as How Warragul Industrials landed Harmit Singh as senior coach
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