BECALMED

by Whispering Jack

Australia Day 2007.

It's a beautiful, calm summer's morning as I make my way towards the Trinity Grammar playing fields to take in Melbourne's skills training session.

A little more than four months have elapsed since the Dockers beat the Demons at Subiaco and I reflect on how the team has disappointingly bowed out of each its past three finals campaigns.

Melbourne seems to have developed a habit of peaking a little after mid season, limping into the finals and then faltering without mounting any real challenge to the top AFL teams in September action. This story has by now been well documented.

Which brings to mind an old adage in sport that you're only as good as your last game.

I'm reminded of how Melbourne was playing with confidence and had Fremantle rattled and held a 15-point lead midway through the second quarter of the 2006 Semi Final. Then Chris Connolly made a few changes and the Dockers proceeded to turn the game by running the legs off their visitors who were becalmed and eventually wilted by the warm humid air drifting into Perth from the Indian Ocean.

Freo's midfield had too much pace with Heath Black, Byron Schammer and the Carr brothers all winning plenty of quality possessions. With a few exceptions, the Demons appeared sad and slow and in the end lacked the necessary endurance to run out the full distance of a gruelling finals game. This applied not only to the on ball brigade but to the forwards and backs - they fought hard but for the most part were beaten mentally and physically all over the ground.

That was our last game and it stands as a reality check as I cross the Eastern Freeway and approach the training venue.

This is the time of year when the general feeling at every club is one of optimism looking forward to a new season. You will hear the same story everywhere - the injuries suffered in the previous year are healing, the players are looking fitter than ever, those who have previously been labelled as "potential" are starting to mature and there are a fair number out there who are, as they say in the classics, "training the house down."

But I'm not here looking for the stars at training. What I want to see is something that might signal a change – that things are happening to address the problem of those end of season fadeouts; that Melbourne is taking steps to ensure that it has the physical and mental wherewithal to match it with the best throughout the long grind of an AFL season. This was the major factor that was lacking in 2004, 2005 and 2006 when the team peaked too early!

I'm not particularly into describing training drills but I must say that a lot was going on by the time I arrived. Players in different coloured guernseys were running with their footballs up and down the length of the playing fields and one thing that was clear was the emphasis on running. The rule changes and the latest coaching tactics and strategies have demanded more and more athleticism. It's not enough to just be a footballer these days.

Enter Melbourne's new fitness advisor Bohdan Babijczuk.

Babijczuk has received plaudits as fitness coordinator at Hawthorn (where he was seen as a key component of the Hawks' push to the Preliminary Final of 2001) and with the national men's basketball team. His experience in athletics goes back three decades from competitor to high level coach and he has been used as a consultant at a number of different football clubs.

At Hawthorn, he took Shane Crawford's 800m time down from the 2:20's to well under two minutes and Crawford went on to win a Brownlow Medal fortified by his added speed and endurance. More recently he took Western Jets youngster Bachar Houli under his wing and improved his 20m sprint time from 3.25 seconds to 2.96 seconds within a fortnight by the time of National Draft Camp. Houli was subsequently drafted by the Bombers in the recent National Draft and I understand has since significantly bettered that time at Essendon.

The Babijczuk influence at the club is apparent immediately. Many of the players have significantly changed body shapes, the skinfolds are way down and a few look faster and stronger as well as sleeker. Nathan Jones and Brock McLean stand out. Jones has dropped 7kg to 80kg - a loss of almost 10% of his previous body weight.

"He is a cut above the rest," Jones says of the man who is training footballers at the club to be fitter, faster and stronger than they have ever been. Daniel Bell, who has lost 3kg, talks of feeling much better and having the capacity to get through pre season training pain free under his regimen. Brent Moloney is training solidly and is definitely moving more freely as he relishes the absence of the osteitis pubis that put a premature end to his 2006 season.

A few years ago I spoke with a Hawthorn player who was competing during the summer season at the Glenhuntly athletics track. He was suitably impressed by the fact that Babijczuk had tailored individual fitness regimes for every player at the club aimed at increasing the intensity once things got simple.

The training regimen requires a fair degree of strong discipline from the players and that part is certainly showing out starting at the top. David Neitz is looking more like a rising colt in his mid-twenties than a veteran who has passed his 31st birthday. Babijczuk says that the player whose speed has improved the most is another post 30 year old in 2006 All Australian James McDonald and it looked that way as Junior zipped through a training drill aimed at moving the ball swiftly out of the clearances.

The players flash past and it's difficult to recognise some of them as they sport different hair colourings; they change guernseys regularly and then there are those different body shapes. Nathan Carroll, who kept key Dockers forward Matthew Pavlich well held in that last game at Subiaco, seems to have undergone a complete personality change since he arrived at the club as an unknown rookie from Fremantle a few years ago. After a year in which he must have come tantalisingly close to being an All Australian, he knows now that he belongs in AFL circles. I expect that both he and Jared Rivers will gather further in stature with the benefit of this pre season.

I could go on and on but I'd probably be charged with the same over optimism I complained about earlier and the point is that a football hasn't yet been bounced in true competitive anger.

That will change in the next few weeks as the intra practice games start. Apparently the club is planning one at Moorabbin and another at Telstra Dome in the week before the Nab Cup matches to give the Channel 7 crew a bit of practice for the forthcoming season. There's no truth in the rumour that The Twelfth Man has been pirated away from Foxtel to do the voices of all of Seven's football commentary team as a cost saving measure (although he does do a very speshialllll Bruce McAvaney impression).

If anyone fears that the intensity of athletic training might be harmful to the players, they should think again. Virtually the full squad was on hand at Trinity Grammar with Chris Johnson the only absentee - he was back in Perth to celebrate his 21st birthday. A small group is still in rehab, notably Colin Sylvia (shoulder and OP) and Clint Bartram (ankle) but they are apparently not far away from resuming training. A couple of others like Paul Wheatley and Matty Whelan sat out parts of training but on the whole things were looking good - even when I took off my rose coloured glasses.

There's a lot of interest in the new blood at the club but none of them stood out at this training run. They're all still young and shy and have a way to go although there are some reports that James Frawley might get a run in the NAB Cup. Both he and Colin Garland certainly have awkward kicking styles that nevertheless don't appear to inhibit their accuracy. However, we'll wait and see what they're like under pressure in matches.

Simon Buckley looks ready for a crack at the big time after a year with Sandringham, Shane Neaves has developed a six-pack and will be looked at with interest while Michael Newton will surely be tested in the Nab Cup. My early tip for big improver among the younger brigade is Lynden Dunn - another of Bohdan Babijczuk's projects.

Ultimately however, the players are in the hands of Neale Daniher and his coaching panel. They now have under their control what is most certainly a more athletic group with greater pace and better endurance than that which left 2006 behind them at Subiaco.

But there's a long way to go from a calm and balmy summer's day at Bulleen to what this group might achieve in the months to come when the springtime returns.