Coach and saviour Paul Roos talks to his players. Picture: Wayne Ludbey. Source: News Corp Australia
PAUL Roos is the first proven coach - and premiership mentor - at the Melbourne Football Club since Ron Barassi made his grand return in 1981 with a five-year plan ... and with the image of a messiah.
Football clubs do make a habit of reliving history. The question with Roos is: Has Melbourne finally learned one man cannot save its club?
The Demons are renowned for seeking saviours.
Barassi failed, simply under the burden of being asked to carry Melbourne to salvation on and off the field - remarkably after the Demons had undermined his mentor, Norm Smith, in 1965 when its hierarchy feared having one man stand bigger than its club.
Stan Alves started his VFL senior career as Barassi left Melbourne for Carlton in '65.
He finished his 226-game journey at North Melbourne with Barassi as his coach.
"At North Melbourne, Ron Barassi was an outstanding coach because all he did was coach - and he never had to step out of that role because he had a strong support mechanism around him," Alves says.
Adelaide coach Brenton Sanderson admits Taylor Walker could have played in the AFL this week, instead he'll be making his return in round nine while his teammates take on the Melbourne Demons and former teammate Bernie Vince.
"Ron went back to Melbourne as the guru ... and not just as a coach, but in marketing, fundraising. And when the playing list was nowhere near what he had at North Melbourne, you can't work miracles."
Roos, 50, has returned to coaching - after a two-year stint in the media - in an era when AFL coaches are part of the marketing and corporate dollar chase.
But, as Geelong proved with Mark Thompson in 2006, there is a danger when a coach takes on much more than coaching.
Roos also has inherited a player list that has managed just eight wins in 2011, four in 2012 and two last season - and a football club that is seen to have failed with its recruiting and has infrastructure that appears inferior to the league's pacesetters.
Against this backdrop, can one man again try to save the Melbourne Football Club?
"Absolutely not," Roos says. "And we have enough history lessons in this era to highlight that.
"Geelong and Hawthorn are not about just the coach or the chief executive. And my experiences at Fitzroy and Sydney emphasise the importance of a collective effort - and getting the right people in the right positions.
"Ultimately, it will be the players who have the biggest say ..."
Much is made of Melbourne's recruiting - and the lack of development of players taken with prize draftees. Did the Demons' recruiting scouts err? Or is the development program at Melbourne a failure?
In the late 1960s Melbourne simply failed to recruit quality. It lived to the belief players still valued the honour of being a Demon and earning MCC membership after five years on the football club's list.
"It was terrible," Alves recalls.
"Players were identified ... and they'd finish up going to other clubs. The game was becoming professional - and Melbourne did not see the need to (pay)."
Today, Roos has a draft that does not let players slip. His reputation as a Hall of Fame player and a premiership coach at Sydney, allows Roos to lure targets such a Bernie Vince who thought he would be a one-club player at Adelaide.
But now that Roos is on the inside - rather than debating the "recruiting v development" question on the couch for the Fox Footy Channel - what does he make of this log-running question.
"I don't know yet - not after six rounds," Roos answers.
"I don't know what the players have been told or taught - and it hard to take on the burden of what has happened here in the past five years.
"As much as I understand the frustration of the Melbourne supporters, my task is to look to the future - to develop this list as quick as I can. That is all I can do at this time."
So where is Melbourne today? Apparently, at ground zero.
"I'm not happy to with the term 'rebuilding'," Roos said. "We are in the process of trying to play AFL footy - we are a team that has not played AFL football in a long time. Our challenge is to do that on a weekly basis.
"In the short-term, we have to set minimum standards for what is demanded in the AFL on a weekly basis. We're into finding out who can and who can't meet those standards. Good clubs go through that process.
"How long will that take? That depends on talent - look at Hawthorn and Geelong. Great talent creates great teams."
The image of the late Dean Bailey working out of a moveable hut when he coached Melbourne (2008-11) continues another theme that lingers with Alves from the end of the Smith era.
"We were not up to speed," Alves recalls of the infrastructure at Melbourne in the late 1960s. "We had to finish training early because we had no lights - and on the way home I would pull up to Richmond's ground to see them work under Tom Hafey. They would train longer than us. We were caught in a time warp."
Roos says Melbourne is also lost in a crowd of 10 Victorian-based teams in an 18-club national competition.
"Like a lot of teams, Melbourne is trying to find its identity again ... you can get lost in this competition," he said.
Barassi had a five-year plan. Roos intends to be at Melbourne for at least two, perhaps three seasons - and with a successor in place by the end of this year. Alves hopes Roos reconsiders. So does that mean he thinks one man can save Melbourne?
"No," Alves says. "Paul Roos is a fantastic appointment - and having Peter Jackson as the club's chief executive is just as crucial.
"Together, they have to build new infrastructure at Melbourne - and when you compare Melbourne to the structure they have around the coach at Geelong and Hawthorn, you see the Demons are coming from a long way back."
Is Roos prepared to be more than a short-term coach at Melbourne?
"No - I am clear what I have to do and what I signed up to do," Roos said.
Clearly, one man cannot save Melbourne.
Melbourne coach Paul Roos celebrates the win against Carlton with his players. Picture: Wayne Ludbey. Source: News Corp Australia
DEMONS IN HELL
MELBOURNE is the world's oldest football club - formed on July 10, 1858 - and a foundation member of the VFA and the VFL (that is today the AFL).
In 1964 the Demons won their 12th VFL flag, ranking second only to Collingwood as the competition's most-successful club. In the 50 years since this triumph, Melbourne has:
WON no flag and fallen to fourth in the league premiership rankings - behind Carlton (16), Essendon (16) and Collingwood (15).
PLAYED in just two grand finals - 1988 (losing to Hawthorn) and 2000 (losing to Essendon).
COMPETED in just 12 final series - with a 23-year gap between the 1964 grand final and the 1987 major round. The last finals appearance was a semi-final loss to Fremantle in Perth in 2006.
CLAIMED seven wooden spoons - 1969, 1974, 1978, 1981, 1997, 2008 and 2009.
CONTEMPLATED a merger with Hawthorn in 1996.
FALSE PROPHETS
MELBOURNE'S greatest period of success - six premierships from eight grand finals from 1954 to 1964 - was achieved under the legendary stewardship of coach Norm Smith. The Demons have repeatedly sought a "saviour" to restore the club's premier standing in Australian football - and learned no man can save Melbourne on his own.
That challenge even beat the great Ron Barassi who returned to the club as coach - after his success at Carlton and "miracle" at North Melbourne - in 1981.
He inherited talented youth - the Demons' under-19s played in three consecutive grand finals and won flags in 1981 and 1983 - but the seniors ranked last (12th) in Barassi's first season, 8th, 8th, 9th and 11th during his five-year plan.
Barassi later said: "In the five years we were there, I think we raised the level of the club quite substantially. Melbourne reached the preliminary final two years after we left, and the grand final the year after that. I felt we did some of the ground work."
THE NEW SAVIOUR?
PAUL ROOS
THE man who ended VFL-AFL football's longest premiership drought - the 72-year wait at South Melbourne-Sydney - is the 12th man to coach Melbourne since Norm Smith left the Demons in 1967.
Paul Roos returned to coaching this year - after two seasons as a media commentator - with a two-year contract and option for a third season. He has taken on one of the toughest jobs in Australian football with, reportedly, the richest contract ever offered to a coach: $1.5 million a season.
"IT is a fantastic appointment, but I hope he stays longer - it is not a two-year job."
Former Melbourne player and St Kilda coach STAN ALVES.
Saving Dees takes more than one man
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Saving Dees takes more than one man
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