Mick Malthouse and Nathan Buckley at Collingwood training. Scott Pendlbury says the club was very relaxed in Mick's latter years in charge. Picture: George Salpigtidis Source: Herald Sun
WHEN Collingwood announced the "succession plan" in 2009, naturally there were some mixed emotions.
On one hand, we were over the moon that our former captain Nathan Buckley turned down offers from other clubs to become our senior coach in waiting
His first year-and-a-bit in the gig has been exceptional, justifying the club's decision to sign him up.
How the Blues picked up Mick
While the jokes and lookalikes that he rolls out in team meetings leave a lot to be desired, "Bucks" has brought about some necessary change to the Westpac Centre as head coach.
I'm not saying one is better than the other, but maybe in Mick Malthouse's latter years we got a bit comfortable.
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Mick and Bucks manage personalities a little differently and, from about 2009-2011, some little things were probably slipping through the guard.
As a group, we wanted to tighten the screws a little bit.
Whether it was the training intensity dipping at times, wanting more involvement from the guys in team meetings, or some players using a longer leash from the coach, we knew we could all get better in a few areas.
These were only small, day-to-day things.
But overall, when Bucks took over, as players, we made a decision to become more responsible for driving our own culture. We had to.
We knew we had a talented, hard-working playing group and we wanted to make the most of our on-field potential.
To do that, we all agreed that we needed to hold everyone to account, no matter what the consequences were, and since then, the buy-in from the group has been as good as I've seen it.
With the help of leading teams, it's great to see young guys in meetings having the confidence to stand up and have their say.
The whole group is getting used to receiving that open and honest feedback from each other, as I'm sure many other clubs do as well.
But I also think the club we are playing today, Carlton, is very fortunate to have Mick at the helm, plotting our downfall at the MCG.
Mick is a father figure to a lot of the boys.
He is a man who turned many of the Magpies players into the footballers we are today. For that we will be eternally grateful and will always share a very close bond with our 2010 premiership coach.
A few years ago, when the club announced the 2011 campaign would be his last as senior coach, you definitely felt for him.
Towards the end of that year, I felt he was coaching as well as he ever had.
We were banged up pretty badly with injuries by the 2011 finals series and to get us to the Grand Final, let alone within reach of Geelong at three-quarter-time, was a super effort.
Despite all the talk at the time, Mick never took his eye off the ball.
It was always about the team, succeeding as a group and doing it for each other and for the memories.
He was always educating and motivating.
He is the kind of mentor who could inspire you to run through a brick wall.
We'll always have enormous attachment and respect for Mick.
Although I haven't really spoken to him outside football and in his media roles over the past 18 months, I know I could pick up the phone today (OK, maybe next week) and have a chat about anything and he would be 100 per cent there for me.
I've not had the conversation with them, but I'd imagine a few of the boys wanted Mick to stay on as senior coach at the time.
I can understand why. It is human nature to resist change.
Sometimes you want to keep things as familiar as possible rather than leap into the unknown.
But it is my honest opinion that the succession plan helped the club achieve the best of both worlds.
You can call me Switzerland, but rather than take a side when the issue was up in the air a bit, I just had faith in the footy club to make the right call.
As Mick would always say, let the baker bake the bread. Let the administrators worry about sorting out the coaching matters and as players we'll get on with doing our thing on the field every weekend.
That's why I personally wasn't distracted by the coaching change. While I can obviously understand the fans' interest in the succession plan, I don't bother to worry about where we would or wouldn't be if Mick was still in charge. He's not, so we move on.
Both of the guys handled the switch extremely professionally.
There was never any awkwardness or agitation.
Initially, there was some external talk about some of the boys not getting on with Bucks. It makes us laugh reading that stuff because it couldn't be further from the truth.
Bucks is one of the most genuine, approachable, inviting blokes I've ever met in footy.
I've heard that it can be hard for some of the greats of the game to make the transition to coaching because they might not understand, for example, why a youngster can't go out there and do some things naturally. That tolerance and patience doesn't always come easily for some.
But one of Bucks' great coaching strengths is his ability to relate to any player regardless of their age and ability and how he can hold all the players on the list to account.
From the captain to the youngest player, he is a man for everyone. He makes sure all the players are responsible for the same things.
Like a parent, there is no special treatment, no favourites.
Everyone is measured by the same criteria. A lot is written and talked about Dane Swan, but there haven't been too many training sessions or games that he has missed.
The guys who are the best players go out and train every day and have full pre-seasons and he's one of those. He's had a tremendous summer and everyone is on the same page. To break things up during the week, we all try to stir Bucks up when we get the chance. Usually, it's the same tactic.
Find a shirtless photo of him on the internet and put it up on the wall of our team meeting room.
We all get a good laugh out of him arms crossed, flexing his biceps or pumping out that big chest in the picture.
He takes it well, but today is all business. It's always a massive game against the Blues, who stitched us up twice last year.
Mick has never been a big fan of taggers, so maybe it will be a head-to-head shootout in the midfield.
It's great to notch my 150th game against Carlton, in front of a group of my friends and family, who have come from my home town of Sale for the game.
We need to keep our momentum rolling with another victory.
Last weekend's win against North Melbourne was a nice start, but we have to bring that intensity every weekend. There needs to be an even contribution.
We feel that pressure and defensive intensity will be the key to our season.
We can't rely on our offence to win every week. Defence, however, is different because it's more of a mindset.
No doubt Mick knows a lot about our strengths and weaknesses, but things have changed under Bucks.
It's great that both are in the big office at two clubs, locking horns in one of the biggest home-and-away games of the year today.
Hopefully, it's our current coach, rather than our last one, who wins this time.
