Tiger treachery
×
Right ▼
FOOTBALL politics are vicious, often more scurrilous than Federal politics. No matter what service and loyalty a player gives a club there is always somebody ready to stab him in the back. I believe I was the victim of football treachery twice—once as a Richmond player and once as coach. Probably the men responsible don’t feel it was treachery but for the good of the club. Results don’t show that.
My first taste of club politics came at Tigerland in 1939 and my second in 1951 when I was sacked as coach of Richmond in favour, of all things, an ex-Collingwood player, Alby Pannam. It was a rotten deal and I’ve never before discussed it. I couldn’t. The disappointment of my own club turning against me for a Collingwood man still hurts.
The 1939 trouble came when my father was on the committee of the club. He and some of my supporters on the committee were convinced Bentley had reached the end of his value as a player and wanted him to retire and become non-playing coach. I was to be captain. I had nothing to do with the deal, although Bentley blamed me for many years.
Bentley supporters decided to get my father and his group off the committee and they persuaded a number of former players to oppose them. It was a foregone conclusion. Players will always win these elections, but I hated them for using players I had teamed with to knife my father. Blood is thicker than water and I was enraged.
×
Left ▼
I told the club I was quitting and it threw them into turmoil because they were on the way back to the top and I was at the peak of my form.
I really didn’t want to leave the Tigers and was only bluffing. I loved them and they were my life, regardless of the riff-raff that had crept into the club. But to stir things up a bit I kept inventing offers from V.F.A. clubs to join their ranks. I was hoping I would get offers, but the only genuine one I received was from Yarraville, and I had no real intention of accepting it.
Finally Richmond’s committee invited me down for a war-talk to clear the air. I hadn’t attended training and was two stones overweight. They came up with a decent sort of compromise and then invited me to leave the room to think it over. I’d already made up my mind before I left, but decided to let them stew for half an hour. When I was called back I agreed to the compromise, which was a lucky decision because I learned later if I had not accepted they were prepared to give me an open clearance.
They agreed to give the clearance, hoping a year away from the club would cool my temper and enable me to rejoin the club. But if I crossed to the V.F,A. without the clearance I would be barred from coming back. It was the period of the big walk-outs on the V.F.L. when Rod Todd and other stars went to the V.F.A. without a clearance. When Todd left Collingwood the fiery Jock McHale ordered his portrait to be turned to the wall and roared at his players, ‘That’s what we do to traitors!’
Bentley played the season out and was worthy of his place in the side and he got us into the finals. He scarcely spoke to me for years, blaming me for the big row. I couldn’t explain to him that I didn’t want his job, I was getting more money than he was by not being captain. Club supporters were making my money up to £10 a week and the captain-coach was receiving only £7. To take the position I had to drop £3 a week and that was a fortune pre-war.
×
Right ▼
Just to show how fickle Richmond were at the time, Bentley got the axe the next year all over 10 bob a week. He wanted a rise to £7 10s.—and they wouldn’t give it to him, so he quit. They told me bluntly I was captain-coach at £7 a week. That promotion was more of a demotion to me when I thought of that £3 a week. Still, I was realizing my ambition and I was proud to be following in the footsteps of Checker Hughes and Perc Bentley. By the time I was sacked in 1951 Richmond had had only three coaches in 26 years. It has been a different story since, they’ve changed coaches like I change my socks.
In my 10 years as coach we made the four six times and missed out twice on percentages. A record I was proud of, but it didn’t save me from the sack in 1951 when a secret meeting of the club executive instructed me to resign. That was the hardest blow of my career. Even when they told me to finish up as a player it had not hurt as much. I still feel strong resentment over the deal. The men who told me to resign included Harry Dyke, the current president Ray Dunn, Senator Pat Kennelly and a character named Lingwood Smith. They didn’t put their decision to the committee because they knew I had too much support.
Dunn acted as he always had done for Richmond, as a ruthless business man. He didn’t think I was getting the results and he wanted a change. I’d missed the four two years running and I can forgive him because he is 100 per cent dedicated to Richmond. Pat Kennelly had a bad stutter and the vote was probably carried before he could get his answer out. So I don’t really know if he was against me.
What I resented most was Lingwood Smith. He wasn’t a Richmond man. I think he came from South Melbourne. I hated him for what he did and what I believed he was doing to Richmond. I couldn’t talk to him even if I met him today.
×
Left ▼
The crowning hurt was the appointment of Pannam. I was feeling low and stayed away from the club for the best part of the year, although I had a staunch friend in Maurie Flemming, the Richmond president before Dunn. He kept pleading with me to come back to the club until finally I could stay away no longer. I didn’t realize how much I had missed the old black and yellow until I stood once more in the rooms. Pannam sneered at me, ‘Oh, you do come back?’ I should have spat in his eye.
I like to see the Tigers on top and I’ll never be happy until they are the most feared team in the League again, but under Pannam they shot down the ladder and they haven’t been back in the finals since. Offers have been made to me to coach Richmond, I have refused and I will never coach them again, it’s a young man’s job. But I do relish rubbing salt in Ray Dunn’s Wounds over the repeated failures of Richmond. But it is a sad conquest and think he knows I would do anything at all to see them back on top again. I have been active on the recruiting field and with secretary Graham Richmond we have gathered some top recruits. I am sure Richmond are now back on the way to the top.
When I was sacked they told me they wanted a different style of football to the brand I was teaching. They wanted it nice, clean and open. They started a trend for frightened footballers and frightened footballers don’t make the finals. I should have seen the writing on the wall in 1949 when they put Pannam in as reserves coach. I should have known The Mouse wouldn’t be happy with that position for long, so perhaps Fitzroy’s Kevin Murray was lucky when The Mouse failed recently in a bid to be appointed coach of the Fitzroy reserves.
Although there is a great deal of bitterness in me over these two dubious deals, the bitterness is trifling compared to the great pleasure I get out of the memories of many fine matches and many fine men football has produced in my time. To be coach of Richmond was my greatest ambition, but I was worried when I took over from Bentley. I didn't feel I was ready for the job. I was too young. I couldn’t talk and I knew I had a lot to learn.
The coaching appointment came out of the blue, we had all expected Bentley to be around for years and it was suddenly thrust on me at the start of the 1941 season. I didn’t have much time to formulate a training policy, but it wasn’t really necessary, Bentley was a great coach and I just had to take up the reins where he dropped them.
×
Center ▼
We were not strong in talent, having about one star for every four positions, but the battlers had been taught their trade well and were a competent team. They quickly showed they had no resentment of me taking over from Bentley and there were no problems up to the first match. I preached comradeship and teamwork to the players and they put everything into their training.
The fearful day came when I had to coach them for the first time in a match. It was against Footscray. I was lost for words and it seemed every supporter and official crammed into the dressing-room for my maiden speech.
It must have been the shortest speech on record before a League game, it lasted less than 30 seconds. I based it on the successful speech of a country coach who pointed through the dressing-room window at the scoreboard and said, ‘There’s the scoreboard, put the score on it.’ The boys didn’t let me down, they gave Footscray a hiding and I felt as though I’d won a Premiership.
They went on winning and with every match I gained in confidence. My speeches extended to five minutes, to 10 minutes, to 30.
×
Right ▼
I knew we had weaknesses and football was just entering the pace era. We had to play it tight. Fortunately the responsibility didn’t upset my play, if anything it deepened my concentration and I was a better player. But speech-making is vital to good coaching and I was far from satisfied with my efiorts, although we were winning matches. I wanted to be able to lift the players when we were down. I could do it on the field with football but not in the dressing-room with words.
Maurie Sheahan, a schoolteacher, used to take shorthand notes of my addresses and together we worked on them, improving the grammar and the effectiveness. As time passed it brought its reward. I could feel I. was starting to get a grip on the players, stirring them to greater efforts. It’s a spine-tingling sensation when your words alone turn defeat into victory and you realize your players would put up their life for the side.
They say it is impossible to love a man but I loved every one of them. I’ve had my ups and downs but I have many great memories of those 10 years of coaching.
Footnotes
This article is an excerpt from Captain Blood: Jack Dyer as told to Brian Hansen. Published in 1965 by Stanley Paul & Co. Ltd.
Comments
This article does not contain any comments.
Login to leave a comment.