Essendon’s challenges approaching the business end of the season have been well documented, but Craig Vozzo remains optimistic in the clarity it will give the Club going forward.
A wide array of topics were on the table for the CEO’s interviews with 3AW and AFL Nation over the weekend, with Vozzo touching on the Dons’ draft strategy this year, fixturing hopes for next season and the wider mindset within the four walls.
The rundown from Vozzo’s wide-ranging discussions:
Vozzo on… silver linings
(3AW)
“It has definitely (been a quick way to find out about the list).
“I guess that’s the silver lining of the injury toll we’ve had this year, we’ve got good exposure to the broader list – we’ve only got three or four of them that haven’t been exposed and possibly one or two more still to play.”
(AFL Nation)
“Talking at a personal level, it’s a great chance to lead and a great chance to reflect on your own personal values and those at the Club.
“We’re digging deep on those and making sure we still give people confidence to do their job, get through and stick together in a unified way. We’ll get through it all.”
Vozzo on… competition for spots, decision making
(3AW)
“Even the four mid-season draftees, they’ve probably all exceeded our expectation to a degree, so it’s making our decision making even sharper and harder as we get to the pointy end.”
(AFL Nation)
“You’ve probably realised the extent of depth you do have on your list and it’s going to make your team much harder to select.
“I feel that we’ve needed that competition for spots and a lot of those kids have taken their opportunities.”
Vozzo on… injuries
(3AW)
“It’s never (down to) one thing, and if you look at our injury list, up to 10 of them are in that uncontrollable basket – four knees, Achilles rupture, Lisfranc, long-term concussion, syndesmosis, we’ve had a mixed bag of those horrible injuries.
It’s probably a combination (of factors), now’s a good opportunity with Sean Murphy finishing up to address the issue, look bigger picture and look at the entire structure of high performance and medical, that’s what we’re in the process of doing right now.
Vozzo on… style of play
(3AW)
“When you drill down deeper to that in terms of the style of play we’re trying to implement, it’s a really tough time.
“I’ve admired the coaches particularly over the last 6-8 weeks, game style is obviously important but also exposing some of these kids in secondary roles that they probably wouldn’t have got the opportunity to look at through the course of the year has been terrific for us to see.
“Brad’s better than I to talk about style of play, I don’t think at times we’re deliberately conservative. I think we definitely have mid-forward connection issues at times and the last few weeks, we had three of the mid-season draftees and two first-year players in the forward line, it makes it a bit harder in terms of movement and patterns.
"We’ve got to get better with our connection, and offensive ball movement is something that’s an improvement area, I can see it and Brad would as well, it’s always a work in progress.”
(AFL Nation)
“What Brad’s stuck to with his group is a style of play he wants to implement.
“He hasn’t gone into risk mitigation mode from the start of the game for instance when you’re undermanned, old-style putting people behind the ball, it’s been ‘the way we want to play is the way we want to play’.”
Vozzo on… long-term plan
(3AW)
“I hope (this year wouldn’t delay our plan).
“I always look in three-to-five-year blocks and short-medium-long term, from my point of view. Obviously, it has been an obstacle this year, I thought we started off quite well and worked our way into a good spot with the six wins, obviously injuries have made an impact.
“We wouldn’t use (this year) as an excuse, hopefully it’s going to create sharper decisions at the end of the year and some more growth opportunities.
“I know I spoke publicly about an aspiration to play finals this year and it was going to get back, in my eyes, honestly to the growth of our 22-to-28-year-olds.
“You need probably seven or eight of your best 10 (players) available most weeks to be highly competitive and that hasn’t happened through the year, a number of those guys are in that age bracket so that’s hampered our outcomes.
“I’m still aiming to rise up the ladder as quickly as possible and play finals, so I wouldn’t be ruling out anything.”
Vozzo on… player acquisition, Sam Draper
(3AW)
“We’re open to both (taking picks and trading for talent), we’ve talked about this publicly since we acquired those picks.
“We’re not happy with where we’re at on the ladder but the picks are a part of that silver lining, they’re good picks. If we need to take them to the draft, we’ll happily do that but we’re still out to market strongly for high-end talent, that’s for sure.
“We’ve put a pretty strong offer to Sam which indicates we really want to keep him, that’s our position.
“He’s in a decision making phase, we’re doing all we can to have that decision fall our way and hopefully in the coming weeks, not too distant.”
