Donald's Desk: Anthony Rock appointment
Donald's Desk: Trade Week Wrap | Article
THREE players from North Melbourne's flag-winning team of 1996 are steering the club's fortunes again after Anthony Rock was appointed midfield coach last week.
Senior coach Dean Laidley, who played 99 games from 1993 to 1997, suggested in an exclusive August interview with kangaroos.com.au that he would consider the addition of another former Roo to a coaching staff that already included premiership forward Darren Crocker.
Corey McKernan and Matthew Capuano are ruck coaches in a part-time capacity, while chief of football Donald McDonald retired in 1992 after 155 games in the blue and white.
Rock gained coaching experience at Melbourne and St Kilda following his departure as a player from North Melbourne in 1998and then 44 games at Hawthorn.
"I just think that there are some fantastic coaches within the competition that are ex-North Melbourne players," McDonald said.
"You only have to look at the coaching ranks to see that ... there's a fair sprinkling of ex-North boys amongst the ranks. We really wanted to get someone who had a specific skill set and experience base and Rocky fitted the bill perfectly because we've restructured our coaching group.
"We're rapt. He's got an understanding of the club but he's been away for about 11 years now. He's coached his own team, North Ballarat in the under-18s competition, but he also worked with great midfields at Melbourne for a couple of years under Neale Daniher and he's had a really good couple of years under Ross Lyon at the Saints.
"Hopefully it'll be a really exciting challenge for him."
The restructure has seen Essendon dual premiership player Darren Bewick return to coaching the forwards, while John Lamont will put his energy into development.
Crocker will retain his backline responsibilities and Danny Daly will continue as opposition coach.
"We've got Boris (Bewick) to go back and work with the forwards because he did a sensational job with our forward line in 2007," McDonald confirmed.
"We just really feel that he had a fantastic impact on relationships with Lindsay Thomas and Matty Campbell. And we know that he can work with guys like Ben Ross and Leigh Adams.
"[Lamont] has had 10 years as a TAC Cup coach and has got fantastic experience working with young players. We just need to [strengthen] that part of our club. I think we're going to have 25 or 26 first-, second- or third-year players, so John's going to go back and work with Dave Newitt in the coaching of those young blokes as well as be our North Ballarat coach from the Kangaroos' perspective."
The structure is finalised in time for the start of pre-season training on November 3, and McDonald was pleased to keep changes to a minimum.
"We made an enormous amount of change to our structure and our staff last year," he said. "We really believe it just needs to settle a little bit.
"We've just got a group of guys that have done a fantastic job for the last two years in our footy department. [We made] the top four in '07 and in round 22 [of this year] we had an opportunity to be in the top four [again].
"I think they've really worked hard and deserve the opportunities we've given them."
