Andy Gowers, Welcome back to the You Project. This time we're going to actually record the conversation. I thought we'd do that. How are you.
I'm very well, Thanks, Craig. I'm delighted to be back with you. It's always a pleasure talking with you.
Thanks. Man. We better say hello to Tiff because she gets a little bit upset. Hi, Tiff, Hi, just driving the bus. Yeah, Tis been bossing both of us around before we started recording.
But that's thank god, thank god you here, Tiff.
But how good do you sound now?
Unbelievable. Never never sounded better the low bar. It's a low bart.
I'll tell my audience, hey, audience, last time. In almost two thousand episodes of The You Project. Fuck, I'm old h Andy Gower's president of the Hawthorne Football Club. He and I sat down in this very kind of scenario that we're doing right now and had just blew each other away with mind blowing conversation and insights, inspiration.
Fucking it was everything.
It had everything, and one particular dumbass who pressed pause on the recording because they were chatting before it went live forgot to unpause it. So let's hope today, Tif that we can get it all in the can and actually actually push it out of the podcast nest into the stratosphere, that is the public. Can we do that?
I'm here now, I'm here, now it happen.
You're here now to salvages? Ship mate? How have you been? How are you traveling? How's life? How's work? How's the family? How's you know, navigating your fifties? I mean, you know, fucking spring chicken.
I'm as old as you look. All of those subjects that you raise are all in good order. Life is busy, but very energizing. I'm loving what I'm doing, I guess the most. Yeah, the most high profile thing that I'm doing is the Hawthorne Presidency role, but the other things that I do around that are all very important to me as well, including my business interests, my family, my friends, some.
Causes that I'm that I'm interested in and involved in.
So that it's a life is a juggle, but it's a very energizing and rewarding juggle.
So I wouldn't change a thing.
How much how much of your kind of day or days is strategically planned, organized, structured, timetabled, and how much is freestyle? I mean obviously weekends are well, no, even weekends are work for you. So that question stands, is there is there any space or during the footy season it's a bit different.
I guess yeah.
The footy season's fairly full on because I'm often quite often traveling.
Into state, so there are flights to catch and other cities to be in. But that's also an opportunity.
To connect with people involved in the footy club, but also outside and I can I mean, look at us now, we're having this interview over zoom. Technology allows you to be anywhere anytime, really, but look, to go back to your original question, most of my week is structured. There are blocked at times for personal pursuits and and one of the things I'm it's interesting, Well, I think it's interesting. I get asked a lot how do I fit in? Because I exercise a lot. I'm an avid road cyclist.
I can't run anymore because I've got a bad knee, so I switched to cycling about fifteen twenty years ago, and I cycle a lot like I would do I.
Would average three hundred k's a week.
And I often get asked, how do you fit in so much cycling? And my answer is, well, I can fit in everything else because of a cycle that much. It allows me to feel both mentally and physically energetic enough. If I didn't ride that much, I don't think I'd be able to fit in all the other things that I'm doing. So it is crucial to me, and typically that starts my day. I'll start the day with a ride with a group of mates and it sets up my whole day.
Yeah, I think you know the thing about when you work out every day, whether or not it's running, riding, swimming, lifting weights or a combo thereof, or something else, like, you're putting your body through its paces. It makes well probably a tiff does the same. TIFs a box around an lead athlete you train, you were an e lead athlete,
I was just an old has been. But it gives you more energy and focus and horsepower for the rest of the day, so I actually get more done in less time, Like if I gave myself an extra hour or hour and a half and didn't do like I walk rock bottom t case a day and I lift weights every day for an hour, Right, So I went on, I'm going to keep those two and a half hours. By the way, when i'm walking, I'm working quite often,
but yes, I get less done. But because in my brain and my body and my cardiovascular system and my endocrime system and all of that kind of stuff is in pretty good shape for my age, I'm much more effective and productive in the hours that I do work.
Yes, I can completely relate to that, And that's another reason why you know I do that, And to me, it's, well, it's what I've always done. I've always exercised basically.
Not every day, but pretty close to every day, and.
It's just I'm wied that way, and I don't feel like I'm acting normally unless I'm exercising often, so that that's exactly what you just said.
Great, that allows me to.
Perform and to juggle the things that I need to juggle and make sure I'm present and operating as close to full cylinders as I can be, because because I exercised regularly.
This is a weird question, right, But I always think about this for me, Like last night, I did my mentoring group, which is a Monday night group of about fifty odd people online, and among other things, we're talking about how well our brain works at a given age. Our mind, our brain cognitive function, decision making, memory, all that kind of shit. Yes, I'm sixty one and it's hard.
You can't be objective about yourself because you're you, right, your experience of you is totally subjective, but as objective as you can be. How do you reckon your mind and your brain are working at fifty six? You just turn fifty six? Can you happy? Happy birthday? How well do you reckon your brain and your mind is working?
Like?
Do you think it's as good as it was when it was thirty or forty or in some ways a bit better?
I think in some areas it's better.
But I think, look, I'm probably not as up as I was twenty years ago or thereabouts.
But I think i'm.
Just because I'm older, I've got more experience in certain areas. I'm better at certain things, So I think I'm better with relationships. I think I'm better with decision making because I tend not to rush them.
I think that's the.
Biggest lessons I've learned over time is sleep on sleep on big decisions. You don't have to rush into saying yes or no or having a response. You can actually, and it's actually really great advice for any young impulsive people out there.
You know, take your time of a big decisions. You don't have to rush into.
Responding even an interim response other than well, thanks very much, I'll have a think about it and I'll come back to you. That's perfectly acceptable. I think over time, you pick up these life lessons and you're better equipped to deal with what's going on. Whether you're I don't think you're as sharp as you were when you were younger, but I think that with age comes experience.
With experience comes a bit more wisdom.
And you know, I, if I had to name one of my strengths, I think it's calmness under pressure. And maybe part of that is not rushing into quick answers on decisions and so on.
Do you think that we call that or we don't. In Eastern philosophy that being able to be the calm in the chaos is called equanimity. Do you think do you think that capacity to be calm when maybe some people wouldn't be calm, or when some people are losing their shit for you to be the voice of reason? Is that inherent? Is that in your DNA? Is that genetic? Or is that a skill that has developed through being in the middle of pressure over time.
Yeah, that's a great question. I think it's a combination. I don't think I've always been as calm as I am now. I think as a younger man, I was more impulsive and I felt like I had to respond more quickly.
So I think that has developed over time, that part.
I think that I've always been relatively calm, But I think that capability of being calm in a crisis is something that I have worked on, and I've been in a few crises over my time.
So you tend to do you tend to get better at handling them, I think.
And when I say crisis, not too many life and death moments, but life or death moments, but the odd moment that it's been pretty important, pretty stressful, and you know, I think you just learn over time that there's a way to work through this, and we do it rationally, and we do it. We don't have to rush into anything. Let's do it properly.
It's interesting when you think about, like, as an elite athlete, you might have all the skill, all the fitness, all the talent, all the whatever, spatial awareness left foot right foot. If we're talking about footing, you know, blah blah blah. But if you can't deal with pressure, then you can't be a great footballer. You might be an okay one, but you know, like even if you've got all the ingredients in the success formula, yes, you can't perform under pressure.
You can't be the calm in the chaos. It's going to be hard to fulfill your potential.
Right it is. And look, pressure is such an interesting topic of itself. So there was a great quote.
By Zach Tuhey, the former Carlton and Geelong play He had a shot for goal. The siren was the ultimate situation. Siren had gone, his team were down. He needed to kick the goal after the sign quite a big kick. He goes back and he puts it through. He's mobbed by his teammates. Anyway, he gets interviewed after the game and he gets asked the question, how did you handle the pressure of that moment?
How did you how did you think about it?
And he said, there's no such thing as pressure, And then he said, actually I'm wrong. There's pressure in your tires, you know, your car tires, your bick ties and so on. Because you can make you that pressure that is actually a measurable pounds per square inch.
I think it is.
But the reality of pressure is there's only there's really only one person that can put pressure on you, and that is you. You're the only one who can put pressure on yourself. And there's a great approach that you know we talked before about you know, hopefully getting wiser
as you get older. Talking recently with a group of golfers and they asked me the question, you know, how do you know you're on the first tee, there's a big crowd milling around, you've got to you've got to hit the ball off the off the te box and there's all that pressure. How do you handle that pressure? And I said, well, the way to think about it is whether it's the drive off the first t or a crucial part in a game, or Zach Dewey having a shot for goal in a footy match, is you.
Focus on process, not outcome.
The pressure comes when you think, gee, if I miss this kick, we're going to lose this game. Or if I hit a bad drive here, everyone's going to laugh at me on this tea box. Well, just flip flip the script and look at process. So what do I need to do to hit a good drive here? What do I need to do to hold this put? What do I need to do to kick this goal? The win is blowing slightly right to left, so I need
to aim this at the right hand goalpost. You know, I've got my routine that I go through every time I kick the goal. I set jot for goal.
I've got my routine.
So you just focus on process. If you think about outcome, you then start putting pressure on yourself. And I think that's the best way to handle it.
Yeah, I think I think you're right. Like pressure and even anxiety, individual responses to a stimulus. Right, because Zach's in front of goal or wherever, he was, in the pocket, on an angle wherever, and he's not feeling any pressure.
Someone else is feeling three out of ten pressure in the same situation, someone else is feeling eleven out of ten pressure and their sympathetic nervous systems going nuts adrenaline cortisol, and their skill has gone from a nine to a two because there's an inverse correlation between stress and skill, stress level and skill level. Right, all of that is a subjective response. Yeah, it's not a standard thing.
Not at all. Not at all.
And that's why I think whatever situation you're talking about where there is a degree of deceived pressure, yeah, so called pressure, if you can focus on process, whatever the process is that you need to complete the task successfully versus gee, what's the outcome of this task? So when people in theotiating, I mean, look at the situation at the moment with the you know, the.
Israeli hostages negotiating release. If you focused on the outcome of that, that would be, I reckon, probably the most pressurized negotiation or situation you could possibly be. And you've got.
People's lives literally at stake versus well, what is the process.
To get to what we want to achieve here?
Now that's an extreme example, but everything in between from a put on a golf course to stating for people's lives. If you can focus on the process, the best process possible, rather than the outcome that might eventuate, I think that goes a long way to managing so called pressure.
I want to change tack a little bit. So when you were playing footy, you know football was it was the same, but it was different. You know, it's more of a business now again, yes, it's it's more professional now it's more organized, structured. We've got people doing you know everything, you know, dietitians and psychologists and high.
Level coaches, all of that.
How how have you seen, I don't just a commentary like the evolution of footy sense you were kicking it to now you're now you're the president of an AFL club and you you played? Did you play for three teams or two?
Well? I played for I played for three from Bears.
Yeah. Yeah.
The Bears then merged with Detroy, so I changed clubs without changing clubs.
Really yeah, So Hawthorn and one hundred forty games, which is exactly one hundred and forty more than me.
Well done, one hundred and forty together?
Yeah yeah, between us you, me and if of us and forty games.
Yeah yeah.
And also between the three of us about fifteen boxing matches. That's right, isn't it? Tiff? That there you go? So thanks very much. I feel much better about myself.
So you should the company you keep.
Yeah, So what's what's the I mean, I don't know if I want the bad, but what's the good?
What? Like?
What have you noticed in terms of the like the training standards, the facilities, the resources, the pressure. It's been a real evolution over the last twenty thirty years, right.
It's been huge.
So the biggest differences are one is they train full time now.
They do have one mandated day.
Off a week at most clubs, nearly every club they have one mandated day.
Off a week.
Yeah, so they're in at the club every single day, and so that's that's a huge commitment. But by the same token, part of the reason they're in the club a lot more is they're working on what they call prehab, so habilitating your body before you might get injured. Also, recovery from what is a brutal game. You know, you're covering a lot of ground, you're twisting and turning, you're jumping,
you're getting tackled, you're bumping. It's a three hundred and sixty degree game, which is quite quite rare, and yeah, it's a very very taxing game. There are much better recovery resources available now.
To the players.
So that's one big change, I suppose. The other change
is the publicity side of it. So when I started playing, I don't know the exact number of journalists that covered the game, but it was quite small, whereas now I'm told that for every player, there's the equivalent of four accredited media personnel per player, so they're not allocated for each but that's just the quantum of a credit to media people that cover the game now, so footy shows and and of course social media didn't exist at all when I first started playing mm hmm, so that's another
method of publicizing the game. So the attention is very, very exacerbated. It's like a microscope over your life the whole time. And you know, some of the some of the banal.
Stories that you see about you know.
I mean, I do laugh when the news starts with this particular player at this particular club has hurt their hamstring. And I mean, in the scheme of things, this means that that player is going to miss some weeks, they're not going to play for a while.
But you know, you look, you look at.
What's going on in the world, and one guy at one AFL club, which is a game really only played in Australia, he's going to miss two or three games because he's heard his hamstring.
It's not news really, and yet it is. It's big news. Oh my god, this guy's hamstring. What are they going to do?
So that that is a massive change the way that that's covered. Clearly, the compensation for the players, you know, the salaries and so on, bumped up markedly.
And there are some there's good and bad in everything sounds like a song, is that there's good and bad in everything, and you can you can focus on the negatives of the social media and what have you.
But by the same token, you've.
Got accessibility now to technically one hundreds of that. Bailey Smith has something like, I'm going to get the number wrong, but four hundred thousand followers on Instagram.
Tiff, can you find out for us Tiff Instagram Bailey Smith. Yeah, and think about that. He can just he can do a little video and talk to four hundred thousand people whenever.
He wants, every time he does anything on Instagram. However, many followers he's got, they technically see it.
So we're seeing now the opportunity for players to organize individual contracts and promotional deals with businesses who are looking to reach different audiences, and they've got the capability of doing that. So that's that's been a real shift.
Could you imagine, Andy, could you imagine back in the day, what's your answer?
Tive three hundred and sixty three thousand and a cracking six pack.
Look at this.
Yeah, yeah, one of the reasons why there are so many that follow.
And he's got a new follower by the sounds of it. Could you imagine back in could you imagine back in the nineties, mate, somebody asking you about your brand and your branding.
By personal branding. No, I can't.
I can't imagine anyone asking you that. But that's where we're at now. And so you know, the world has changed a lot. There are some great opportunities or player.
Hey, and you have a look at Tiff we've lost her.
I think he trains at PC. I see sometimes with one of my mates.
He's gone down the rabbit hole. Yeah, but this is the thing.
So there are there are there are great opportunities available for the modern day player, and but they also have to be careful because they're being more watched than ever and the world is watching. The eyes of the world are upon them. You know. It's great opportunity, but also more responsibility. And you know, just just the other the other thing I touched on it before, but the club, you know, the football departments now are.
Very very big organizations. Medical teams coaching teams. So we have nine senior coaches in the men's program at Hawathorn, So there's.
A senior coach and then eight other coaches and so fucking amazing. It's just so different when I played. When I first started playing, we had a senior coach and we had a reserves coach and that was it. Now we had a chairman of selectors, but he he helped I suppose pick the side and would come to training and so on, and would sit in the box on match day. But really you had you had two coaches. We had the senior coach and you had the reserves coach.
So that has really changed the dynamic within the football club and the atmosphere and so on.
It it seems to me that there's been a lot more awareness around focus on and attention to, quite rightly a psychological and emotional health of the players. And we've seen some things happen, very sad things happened recently, which shines a light on it shines a light that needs
to be shine right. But I always I always wondered, mate, like the week that a thousand years ago when I worked at the Saints, the week that I arrived, Matthew Lapper, I think it was Ozzie Jones and Tony Brown arrived, right, And they're all eighteen years old and weighed about four Jones and Brown yeah yeah, yeah, or weighed about forty five kilos each, right, And it's my job to get them big and strong and all that. But I remember thinking, like,
these are boys, these are teenage boys. And I know it was different then, but it was. They was still playing in front of thirty forty fifty thousand people. And they've gone from Matthew Lappan who was like literally six one and sixty one kilos, like living in Chiltern with eight hundred people or something. Now he's playing at the MCG and just the psychological and emotional and sociological adjustment, yes, where they're in. No, like these guys are good at footy,
that's it initially, Like they're drafted. They're drafted for no reason other than they're good at football, which is obvious and that's not a problem. But I used to always think, man, this is such a cataclysmic, bloody jump in their reality where everything is about football, as understandably at that point in time, but now trying to trying to I guess help the people as well as the footballer is a focus.
It's very important.
And then you mentioned those three boys, but also think about the you know, the indigenous boys, that boys and girls.
That come into an AFL environment. So if they're coming from a remote community, just in fact they're moving into a city is a huge adjustment. Yes, let alone getting to know forty odd teammates plus coaches, plus all the people in the club. It must be a sensory overload initially.
So the way that they respond to it and integrate themselves into a completely different lifestyle, which is what you're saying.
It's that their whole life changes.
And then on top of that, they need to be able to focus and train and perform in an elite sport that's highly competitive. So the combination of those things in isolation, sorry, any one of those things in isolation would be difficult. You throw the fall in together and the combination of those things. It's extraordinary what these young men and women have to do to get ready for
the game. But that's what I guess the game demands, and if you're going to become a good player at the top level, you need to understand and apply yourself and approach it that way.
So what's the what's the job or what's the role of an AFL president, So like, what's what's your like, what's required of you? What's your job description?
How long is this podcast?
What the fuck do you?
Well?
It's it's my number one role is to run the board, lead the board, and so the board of directors at every club we're all volunteers. Every every president, every director at every AFL club is a volunteer.
So that's I guess that's number one.
I guess there are other things that spin off that, so there's a lot of time spent with various people within the club. So AFL clubs are made up a whole mix of areas. So you've got the staff.
That run the club.
You've got the playing groups so the aflw and the AFL teams. You've got the members. The members we're going to push ninety thousand members this year, hopefully more than that, so that's a huge cohort.
You've got coterie coterie groups.
So they support the club financially and also they're very passionate about the team and performance and so on. You've got corporate sponsors that are looking for exposure and more business as a result of the association with your club. You've got the media, you've got the other the other club presidents and CEOs and other operators that.
You know you're part of the same industry.
That you've got the AFL itself who you deal with
on a regular basis. So there there are a number of groups stakeholders if you like, that need to be communicated with, interacted with to some degree managed, So there's a there's a constant communication challenge of keeping all of those stakeholders engaged, interested, feeling loved, involved, and so that there's there's managing all of those relationships and then it's I mean the biggest role of the board is to make decisions that are in the best just of a club.
And you've got short, medium and long term decision making.
So right now, a great example, we are building a new home for the Hawthorne Football Club in a suburb of Dingley in Melbourne, and it's a it's a north of one hundred million dollar exercise, so not.
An insignificant decision.
We bought the land, we've developed it and this is stage one.
That we're building. At the moment.
We'll move in there later this year. I haven't decided exactly when that will be it. But that's a very long term decision to commit to a new space, developing it, developing it properly, working out what everybody needs and wants in the in the land, raising the money.
We're still raising money to pay for that build, and so on, things like that. So that's a that's a long term decision.
And there are multiple shorter term decisions that are not as consequential, but nevertheless, all that up. So it's a combination of all those things, interacting with management making sure that they're getting the support that they need from a strategic point of view, so the board should be helping with strategy and implementation of the strategic plan.
So there's always back and forth between management and the board.
M Yeah, they're they're the sort of the main roles and in some ways be the figurehead for the club.
Now.
I say figurehead because really our members they want to hear from our coach, they want to hear from our players mostly now, and then from our CEO who's running the club and now, and then from me, who's who's I guess the figurehead of the organization.
So it's a combination of things.
If you looked at an average week for me, it's going to games, it's speaking at home games, it's doing the odd media interview, it's updating members, it's interacting with management and just making sure things are as much as they can be on track.
Now, this is not a loaded question. Describe no, no, no, no. For my listeners who are AFL people, Yes, we've got overseas listeners of course the IFL Australian Football League. Most of my listeners are you know, somewhat familiar, but we're not a particularly hardcore sporting podcast per se. So the coach of Hawthorne is Sam Mitchell. Tell me about sam Mitchell. I think I interviewed him once for seven minutes on SCN one hundred years ago. But yes, tell me about
sam Mitchell, like, what's he like? Tell me about him as a coach and a bloke yep.
So I think the best context I can give you about Sam Mitchell is as a player, he battled to.
Get into the system.
Initially, he was overlooked at multiple drafts and became a mature aid starter in the game and had to work his way through the lower level the VFL before he got to a far level, and then when he got to AFAR level. Wasn't a particularly quick player. In fact, that was the knock on him while he was overlooked the initial drafts, but an incredible, incredible ball handling skills, worked so hard on his craft. He could kick left
and right foot almost equally as well. Was a great connector with other players in the start, so very very good at bringing others into the game, and captained a premiership side in two thousand and eight, so a really good leader, and handed over the captaincy in later years. So there's a degree of selflessness of that. You can see some players that hang on for quite a while.
He didn't do that.
He handed over the reins to Luke Hodge whilst he was still playing and then together they played in three more premierships for that period. So I think that's a good context to describe what kind of person Sam mitchelluz.
So he's very determined, he's.
Very you know, he'll do the work he will and you know, you see some you see some players not become very good coaches because they were so talented they probably find it hard to communicate well. Why can't you just mark that and kick the goal, because that's what they would have done if they were out there. Because Sam has fought hard, so hard to get into the AFL in the first place, and then made a fantastic career and won a Brown Low and multiple Premierships as I've said.
And a whole lot of accolades.
I think that grounds his coaching, and so he's a very I mean, he's a demanding coach on the players, but they know that he's gone for what he's gone through, so and so he's very respected, very respected coach. He's a great communicator, and I think that's one of the most important attributes as a coach. You need to be able to communicate your message in a clear and concise way,
which he does. And then I think, you know, as a bloke, all those things that I've just talked about a mirrored kind of personality that he is.
You know, he's got a great sense of humor.
He's a great student, He's studied a lot, he looks at other sports, he's done an MBA, he's.
You know, he's an intelligent guy.
He really is so good communicator, intelligent, as I said, you know, he wasn't gifted any AFL. He worked hard to get into the system in the first place, and you'd have to say he made the most of it and then some.
So what you're telling the world is he's no Andy Gowers.
He's a complete opposite to me, that's right, And I really admired that about Sam.
You know, his transition from player to coach. Yeah, yeah, he's had a lorded.
And rightly so aluded playing career, but it wasn't easy, you know, he had to battle and became a fantastic player and really, look, it's actually something that I reckon is a great.
Lesson for life.
I think one of the things that we now do exceptionally well in AFL football is we help people focus on their strengths. And so Sam is not particularly tall, so he was never going to be a.
High marking player.
So ground ball player, got tons of the foot He worked hard, got to lots of contests one is fair share of them, and was a very good user of the footing and that all came through. Yeah, of course he's got some natural talent, all of us do. But I think the key with Sam was he worked so hard on his game. He always had a footy in
his hand. He was always mucking around with a footy and it's like an extension of his body, you know, He's all handling skills were exceptional, and he was able to bring others into the game as a result.
So I really admire that fact and I think it informs his coaching every day. I see that.
It's interesting because you know, of course we need coaches who are not know a lot about training and conditioning and of course football and t have a football brain and read the game and be strategic and make great decisions and perform under pressure. But also we need coaches who have emotional intelligence, situational awareness, social intelligence, and ability to understand human behavior and read people, and like, it's
so much more than just coaching a game of football. Well, from the outside looking in, it seems like you could have a guy who's great with football, or a woman who's great with football for that matter, if we're talking about coaches, but shit with people, and they're not going to make a great coach despite their natural understanding of the game.
One hundred percent.
I mean, it's managing human beings is probably your biggest task, and so part of that is nuanced but you need to understand, well, this particular player, I need to give him a needle.
I need to get him to play his best.
I have to do it selectively, and I might have to keep my power drive for most of the year, but I'm I'm going to I'm going to rev him up at the right moment if he's not performing the way we need him to. He will respond well to that in limited doses. But the reality is, and what I have found is most people they don't respond very well to that. They need to cuddle, They need to be they need to be built up, their confidence needs
to be supported. And it's one of the biggest roles of a coach is working at who needs what when, And there's the collective when you're addressing the whole site, and then the individual.
Well, you might pull.
Aside and not You might you may not give the needle to that player in public. You might do it privately. Or you might say to him, and I've seen this happen with other coaches. You might say to him, I'm about to give you a rocket here. I'm just giving you a heads up in front of the group.
And then you know there are Yeah.
My theory is or my My experience is that most people don't respond very well to that, So you need to be very selective of the type of personality that is open to that kind of feedback or that kind of method those who aren't. I think Sam he treads that that fine line very well.
Yeah, I think it's a unique part of leadership is being able to like this actually ties into my PhD research without trying to bore everyone senselessly, but there's this idea called theory of mind Andy, which is essentially our ability to understand how others think, our ability to understand how others respond to different stimuli, you know, And like I could say something to you and you get pumped
and you go, yep, right, I'm on it. I say the same thing to the bloke to your left and he cracks the shits for three days, and the guy to your right doesn't know what I'm fucking talking about. So it's trying to understand because everyone has their own unique communication style. And I think as a coach, you're trying to because you might have ten players and you know they all are going to respond differently to the same thing.
Well, I learned a great lesson when I was a junior coach, coaching my youngest son.
And they're only little if I was only nine or ten of them.
And I remember I went to a coaching course and they talked about the word butt. You've got to be very careful with the word butt. And I'll give an example. So you say to a young player, Oh, Craig, I loved the fact that you ran onto your left foot, but your kick was terrible.
And what that kid hears is the kick was terrible. I don't hear the first bit.
So the advice from the person who was leading this course was just change butt to and Craig, I really liked what you did when you ran onto your left foot, and next time when you do it, if you just so it's instructional, they tune in more because you're not saying they're waiting for the butt.
But your kick was terrible.
You don't say that, you say, and if you actually guide the ball a bit further down onto that left foot, next time, you'll kick it better and you'll be able to find a teammate. And so the difference in the language, and that's very subtle example, but it helps so much.
Yeah, mate, we've got to wind up. But at the risk of sounding like a sports caster, I'm going to ask you. So we're ten rounds in, we're ten weeks in. Yes, welcome back to Melbourne's home of sport.
In.
We're seven and three. We just got pipped on the weekend. How is everything? How's the club? How's the boys? How are you? How's the energy? How's the vibe?
Yeah, look, the ViBe's good. Yes, we did have a we got pipped the last game. But we'll know a lot more about where we sit as a team after the next four game. So we basically play the top four sides, so yeah, I won't run through them, but we play the top four sides and we're right now in fourth position, so it's all the other sides around us,
and then we have a buy. So by the end of that period we'll know, well, we should know roughly where we sit in the pecking order, and then it's a run into the finals, hopefully for us from there. So I would describe the vibe as upbeat, where the expectations are high. We are really looking forward to these next four games. Then we have a rest and we reset. So but look, the club, the club is up and about we're celebrating one hundred years this year since entering
the vfl AFL, and that's a very big milestone. We had a fantastic celebration a few rounds ago at the footy.
We invited every player.
That has ever played for the club, which was amazing, staff and so on, and that was that was an amazing day. And yeah, so it's a big year for us. We're fairly well positioned, albeit we've got a big test the next four weeks. We'll no more at that point and we're hopeful that we'll be well placed by the time we hit our by.
Well, mate, I'm giving you a nine out of ten on today's podcast and an eight and a half out of ten in terms of your performance as president of the club, just because I want to give you a little bit of room to move.
I appreciate it.
I don't want you to get a fat head or get ahead of yourself. I'll give you an elephant stamp and there's no butt. I'm going to say you did a pretty good job today and and I'm sure you can do a little better next time. Is there any you want anything you want to pump or promote. I don't know this is what people tend to do, but not normally when I've got presidents of AFL clubs on, is there anything you want to push people towards.
Look, the only thing I would say is if within your very large listening audience, and I'm sure they're all rusted on, if there are any Hawthorne supporters who are not members, it's a great time to get on board and support the club and we're going to have an exciting I think into the year and hopefully play finals, and it's an exciting time of the year and the more the merria.
Basically is what I would say.
Perfect. Hey Tiff, did we record that or not?
No, we're going to have to start again.
Mate.
We'll say goodbye affair, but for the moment, thanks for being on the new project. Good luck for the rest of the year. I hope you smash Brisbane on the weekend and we'll talk again soon.
Absolutely pleasure, Craig, thanks so much and thanks Tiff.
Thank you.