Konrad Marshall’s inside account of Richmond’s flag, celebrated here by Jack Riewoldt and fans, is gold. Photo: AFL MEDIA
It’s not long before the start of the 2019 AFL grand final, the scene is the dressing rooms under the MCG, and Richmond coach Damien Hardwick is about to deliver his pre-match address to his players.
The Tigers are attempting to win their second flag of the past three seasons, against Greater Western Sydney. It’s a moment in which AFL coaches have delivered what have become legendary motivational speeches.
Hardwick begins by talking about the three great loves of his life. There’s his family. The club and its players. “And the third one is this (TV) show called Gogglebox – one of the greatest shows ever.”
A video rolls, and there’s footage of three of the show’s stable of TV watchers gazing intently at the box as they dissect various programs as they happen. Suddenly, a pet bulldog appears in shot, and promptly begins humping one of their legs.
“That bulldog is my idol. There was no footy on last night and this is what I’m watching!” the coach enthuses as he and the entire room dissolve into fits of hysterics. “Brutus the bulldog. Do yourself a favour and check him out!”
Hard to believe? No, because that scene is faithfully recorded by an eye witness, respected journalist and devout Richmond fan Konrad Marshall, who has now spent much of the past four years embedded inside the club to record its journey.
The wildly successful venture has already produced in my view the best football book yet written, “Yellow & Black: A Season With Richmond”, Marshall’s 2017 chronicle of the Tigers’ famous drought-breaking flag.
This follow-up, “Stronger & Bolder”, tracks the Tigers through 2019, and is more gold. It’s pure footyhead porn, every up and down (of which there were plenty this year) along the way explained and expanded upon with the reader not only along for the ride, but so informed they feel as though they’re part of the journey.
And like its predecessor, it’s essential reading not only for Richmond fans, but any football supporter who wonders what makes an AFL club tick. Required reading, too, for any of Richmond’s rivals hoping to glean anything about how the Tigers have transformed themselves into one of the best teams the modern era has seen.
Hardwick’s Gogglebox gag is typical of the fun Richmond has along the way, a club and a football group with serious intent, but which knows the value of laughter and happiness, and flicking the switch between intensity and levity.
Hardwick, of course, follows the bulldog story in the pre-match address with a more serious and intensely personal entreaty to his charges.
There’s vision of the players backed by the Bruce Springsteen song “Blood Brothers”, which has become something of a team anthem throughout the season. The coach talks about the incredible togetherness of this particular group.
He then produces, from a tote bag in the corner of the room, a rock. There’s a whole bagful, in fact, one for each player.
Hardwick had intended to deliver a message about Sisyphus, the figure from Greek mythology condemned by Zeus to forever repeat the meaningless task of pushing a boulder up a mountain in Hades, only to watch it roll back down again.
But he’s decided to change tack. He talks about people attempting to complete any difficult endeavour dedicating their effort to someone or something else, a higher cause of sorts.
He’d years before watched then Hawthorn and now Richmond colleague, high performance manager Peter Burge, lug a five or six-kilogram rock up the toughest part of the Kokoda Track, the rock emblazoned with the name of his late father.
Hardwick asks each player to take one of the rocks left in their lockers, and to write on it the names of whomever or whatever they wish to dedicate their grand final performance. “Because if you do it for someone else, you’ll work harder than you’ve ever worked before, and the love that you bring is going to be inside you all day.”
Several hours later, after Richmond’s crushing win, Ben Crowe, another consultant to the club who works in the psychological arena, explains the power of the stunt with the rocks.
“What they did was promote dedication,” he says. “When you do this, two things happen: your purpose goes to a higher plain, and you lose ego. It means your motivation goes to a spiritual place. And that’s powerful.”
Stories are a big part of Hardwick’s coaching persona. Marshall’s first book on the Tigers illustrated that perfectly, and it appears that two years on, in that regard little has changed.
Before the qualifying final win over Brisbane on the road, Hardwick, accompanied by video, turns to soccer for inspiration, telling the story of Brazil’s win in the 1958 World Cup, in which a 17-year-old Pele announced himself to the world, the start of a nation becoming a footballing juggernaut.
Brazil was known for its skill and capacity to score heavily, but Hardwick emphasises the foundation of the team’s play was in fact a relentless desire to defend, that defensive pressure a springboard to lethal counter-attack. Sound familiar?
Each week, before the game, Richmond players will open their lockers to find a gift from their coach in keeping with the theme of his talks. This time, there are 22 Brazilian soccer shirts with Pele’s name inscribed on the back.
These are priceless insights into the Tigers’ psyche. It’s what much football journalism intends to do, sometimes glibly, but often in carefully-researched, thorough analysis of how Richmond does what it does.
Ultimately, though, however well-intentioned, it remains speculation about how the Tigers were making things happen. But on these pages are what, in fact, actually did happen.
Again, it’s also a compelling look into the enormous amount of people and their efforts involved in the day-to-day operations of an AFL club, many of whom we never usually get to see or hear about.
Mindfulness coach Emma Murray is one such person, whose work with Richmond was captured in Marshall’s first look at the Tigers.
Murray is still there, playing an important role. In “Stronger & Bolder”, we go inside one of her guided meditation sessions with the players, which can vary depending on the focus required, be it a state of calm, or practising the art of visualisation.
We’re privy to a line meeting, Richmond’s defenders and their coach, Justin Leppitsch talking tactics just an hour before the qualifying final. The Tiger backmen have adopted a mantra they call “PAC-men”, the “P” for pro-active, “A” for aggressive and “C” for connected.
There’s a deeper insight even into the Richmond faces we know well. Alex Rance, for example, who seriously injured his knee in the first game of the season and was resigned to a spectating role for the rest.
Well, to a point. Rance’s leadership qualities mean he remains a constant presence throughout the season, mentoring younger players, working closely with Richmond’s VFL side, which also won a premiership. He is as involved as any non-playing player can be.
But after he and the club medical team decide not to attempt a late-season comeback, there is also candidness.
“I’ve put on a brave face and gone about my business and tried to look a short distance in front of me – do this session well, do something to make someone better, do something to make people laugh – but it has been a real grind,” he concedes.
“I’m really tired. I’m really looking forward to going away. Because when you have to manufacture that enthusiasm, it does exhaust you.”
There’s great interviews, too, with two of the best stories coming out of Richmond in 2019, debutants Sydney Stack and Marlion Pickett, the latter famously playing his first game in that grand final thumping of the Giants, and detailed chats also with skipper Trent Cotchin, star recruit Tom Lynch and Kane Lambert.
As not only a tremendous writer and interviewer, but full-on fan with an intimate knowledge of his team, Marshall knows the right questions to ask of his subjects, all of whom are clearly completely relaxed, open and honest in his presence.
It’s hard not to read books like “Stronger & Bolder” and its forerunner and not come away with greater affection for a club which has gone to these lengths to let the rest of the world see it for what it is, warts and all.
Indeed, you wonder why every AFL club doesn’t embrace a similar concept.
At a time when it’s harder than ever for football fans to truly get close to the clubs to which they devote so much of their time and energy, Richmond as a club, let alone as a football team, has found great strength through sharing with and caring for each other, the way all staff at Punt Road are taken through the battle plans and strategies for each week’s game just one small example.
It’s a major reason the Tigers have ended up with two of the last three AFL premierships. In “Stronger & Bolder”, Marshall captures and articulates that spirit brilliantly. And if there were flags awarded for delivering the best possible insight into how a modern, successful football club goes about its business, he’d have a couple under his belt now, too.
“Stronger & Bolder”. By Konrad Marshall. Published by Hardie Grant Books, on sale November 18. Produced by Slattery Media. RRP $29.95. Available HERE
