Dear Paul,

You have come under fire from fans of the club, coaches at other clubs and the media about the way you and the board members have handled the whole Neale Daniher affair. I'd just like to throw my support behind you for making a tough and decisive decision on a crucial issue. You could see the writing on the wall that things needed to change in the footy department and went about instigating those changes by calling for the official review. It showed to the fans and sponsors of the club that you were being proactive in pursuing a course of due diligence to turn the fortunes of the club around. The fact that Neale Daniher decided to walk away this week was probably to be expected, he knew his time was up and he's a proud man that wouldn't have been content to sit around for the last 10 weeks as a "lame duck" figurehead. I'm sure that you and the board members were astute enough to have predicted this and once again, my hat's off to you and the board for doing something about our failing fortunes as a football team. It would have been a lot easier to do nothing and let season 2007 take its course. In my opinion leaving the critical task of finding the best possible replacement for senior coach until the conclusion of the season would have been pure folly and left the Club vulnerable to being ill-prepared for the all important trade/draft period. It's fantastic to be in the box seat to get the plum pick of the best available senior coaching candidates and even more heartening to know that whoever is lined up as Neale's permanent successor will have a good couple of months to run the rule over our playing list and get an idea of the drafting/trading priorities to take our team forward and become a genuine top four contender in time.

Once again, my heartfelt thanks go out to you and the board for the way you've handled this delicate situation. I have a feeling that this moment in time could well be looked at as a turning point in the recent history of the Melbourne Football Club. Congratulations for having the guts to make the tough calls that were required.

Oh just one last thing before I sign off: Please make sure you don't bloody hire Chris Connelly

Did you actually send that?

I dunno. All power to you, it's your call... And well done for doing it, if you did.

Personally though, I'm going to reserve my praise for him just for now.

I think he lost a few brownie points (of which he had PLENTY in store) when he went back on his words earlier this week.

In the wash up, what matters is how he handles the hiring of the new coach. The Daniher era is over and the LAST thing he needs to do now is think about it. He has a CRUCIAL and exciting period in which to stamp his identity and influence on this club.

NOW is the acid test for Gardiner, and the results won't be seen for probably another 3-5 years. At that time, I'll thank him should he deserve it.

  leucopogon said:

Dear Paul,

You have come under fire from fans of the club, coaches at other clubs and the media about the way you and the board members have handled the whole Neale Daniher affair. I'd just like to throw my support behind you for making a tough and decisive decision

I'm sure that you and the board members were astute enough to have predicted this and once again, my hat's off to you and the board for doing something about our failing fortunes as a football team. It would have been a lot easier to do nothing and let season 2007 take its course. In my opinion leaving the critical task of finding the best possible replacement for senior coach until the conclusion of the season would have been pure folly and left the Club vulnerable to being ill-prepared for the all important trade/draft period. It's fantastic to be in the box seat to get the plum pick of the best available senior coaching candidates

Oh just one last thing before I sign off: Please make sure you don't bloody hire Chris Connelly

Well written Leucopogon. It had to be said and acknowledged. (esp the CC crack)

The Board has done what HAD to be done - not what they would have Liked to do.

WE are now 6 to 8 weeks ahead of the opposition in sourcing a new coach.

Neale Daniher was wonderful to supporters and will get what he deserves - something great.

Yeah hes great, says one thing does the other, definitely someone I want holding the helm at my club

  On the Demon bandwagon said:

Yeah hes great, says one thing does the other, definitely someone I want holding the helm at my club

Exactly.

Im not a fan of the bloke at all. Comes across as arrogant and fake I reckon.

Needs to learn to keep his opinions to himself.

What Paul Gardner, the Board and Steve Harris has done is take MelbourneFC away from being just a footy club to a business and that is the only way an AFL club can be run sucessfully. Although, I don't like the way that the whole week was done through the media the end result was correct and needed to be done. ND role is to prepare the team to win games and ultimately a premiership his record shows that over the 10 years at the helm the MFC had under 50% win loss ratio.

Now the tough part starts for the club, the next coach will make or break this current board. They have been fantastic getting our finances under control and finally getting our home base started but we need the success. No more accepting defeat, on thing the Essendon ferrals do is expect to win and not to bottom out for long periods of time, we should be the same. Not only finding a coach but we need to find out which players on our current list are required, what younger players can play at this level and what older players are no longer needed.

We have 9 games to go a bottom 3 spot is likely the board and club have some futher big decisions to make.

We are very lucky to have Paul Gardner.

I know a lot of people won't agree, and will go on and on about how he went back on his word ('end of the season' = being 2-10 and losing to Richmond!), but he is a very astute businessman and he has Melbourne's best interests at heart.

To sit on our hands and wait for the spoon at year's end, would leave us with reduced choices and force us into making a quick decision. Would anyone be happy with that?

We've had too many 'nice' guys at Melbourne, and it's time we got ruthless and stop always thinking with our hearts.

He is the best president we've had in a long long time.

OK so if the season is over does that mean you arent going to any more games? Just because you dont make the finals doesnt mean you dont have to play for the next 10 weeks. The season is NOT over and Gardiner promised very publicly that he would wait until then and he didnt end of story

  On the Demon bandwagon said:

OK so if the season is over does that mean you arent going to any more games? Just because you dont make the finals doesnt mean you dont have to play for the next 10 weeks. The season is NOT over and Gardiner promised very publicly that he would wait until then and he didnt end of story

The season is over, and 2008 starts on Monday.

Of course I'm going to go to games, but losing this season does not upset me anymore as we have nothing left to achieve, apart from possibly getting the number one pick.

As I said, would you prefer we sit on our hands, make the decision in Round 22 then have only a few short weeks to find a new coach?

It is better to have plenty of time to get these things right.

BTW, all the board did was hand Daniher a review, a review which Paul and Neale spoke about prior to the season.

It was Daniher who, rightly or wrongly, chose not to go through the process. Maybe he felt his time was up, maybe he didn't think he'd pass the review. Bottom line is, we did what any solid business would do when their staff is underperforming (and we are, badly).

If you separate the emotions from the whole situation, you'll see that going forward, it was something we had to do.

10 years is 10 years. Time to move on, both for our club and for Daniher.

I wish him all the success in the world, and I'm pretty sure he's happy to have some time off himself to evaluate his options.

I wouldn't be surprised to see him at Essendon next year.

It doesnt start Monday because our coach next week will not be our coach next year. I do not understand why he had to go however I cant see why it couldnt have waited to next year

2007 if far from over, we are going to find out which players want to be apart of our team in 2008 and beyond. ND decided to quit mid season, no point having him hang around, lets throw a challenge to an assistant to see if he can coach and instead of seeing the tried players that ND persisted with lets see other younger players that have been on our list for a few years, Newton was the first last night, Buckley will play, Frawley needs to come back in and we need to finally see if CJ can make the grade. When they do play give them ground time, winning doesn't mean much now player development is to most important think.

Jaded you are sort of right about 2008 starts on Monday but it is putitng the planning in place for 2008, the remainder of 2007 will determain several players future with our club.

  On the Demon bandwagon said:

I do not understand why he had to go however I cant see why it couldnt have waited to next year

which is why you sit in the stand and watch, and why PG runs the show.

A pretty good (if not complete) summation of the situation......

Daniher 'let down' by Dees

As MFC supporters we crave success.........we bleat about not having a flag since 64, bemoan the fact that our facilities are not up to scratch, and that in general we are treated as 2nd rate AFL citizens.

The simple fact of the matter is "nothing changes if nothing changes!"

Gardner is implementing change, and it's pretty important that as supporters we don't get scared of that!

We talk of a winning culture, and a culture that demands success.............we can't get upset when a board makes tough decisions in striving for for that success!

leucopogon.......your letter to Paul Gardner was right on the money.

And as Daniher said, it is a great club, and all supporters need to get behind the club moving forward!

  deanox said:

which is why you sit in the stand and watch, and why PG runs the show.

I meant to write end of the year my bad. Note to Paul Gardiner - I will have your job in 12 years and counting down

  On the Demon bandwagon said:

I meant to write end of the year my bad. Note to Paul Gardiner - I will have your job in 12 years and counting down

haha. u can have it. I want his job at grey.

Gardiner made the right Decision.

A tough one but correct.

For the club to wait till the end of the season before making any coach changes would have harmed our sponsorship and Marketing opportunities dramatically. ND would be aware of this aswell. Neale made the right call as well. 2 goals to half time against Richmond was the last straw. For all his positives it proved Neale was no longer able to get the best out of the players, even though it was shown that the players did have his respect.

I have always been an ND fan but i saw problems after round 1. We looked Static and flat. ND as far as i am concerned will always be part of the Demon family but i hope we can get Michael Voss to coach us, but whoever the board elect i shall support as i know the search will be and should be exhaustive. Voss was the captain of a triple Premiership team-you cannot beat that as long as he is a good communicator. Guy Mckenna is also up there, I would hate Voss to coach Carlton-Those Bastards deserve Nothing!

  why you little said:

For the club to wait till the end of the season before making any coach changes would have harmed our sponsorship and Marketing opportunities dramatically.

Then Gardner should have kept his fat mouth out of the press & not said the opposite

  On the Demon bandwagon said:

Then Gardner should have kept his fat mouth out of the press & not said the opposite

Gardiner never expected that totally insipid performance against Richmond. After that Things had to change. If Gardiner and the Board had done nothing, then the Train Wreck would have got worse. Neale still has his Dignity and we can find the best coach out there. without waiting 12 weeks.

  why you little said:

I have always been an ND fan but i saw problems after round 1.

What took you so long?

  why you little said:

For the club to wait till the end of the season before making any coach changes would have harmed our sponsorship and Marketing opportunities dramatically

How do you know this? The relations between sponsor and club are sacrosanct and privy to those within the club only. Anything else is simply outsider speculation. The sponsors would been edgier about matters way before round 1.

  why you little said:

Voss was the captain of a triple Premiership team-you cannot beat that

A premiership winning coach can. As far as his coaching creds are concerned, atm he has zip. He is a punt.

  Alan Smithee said:

What took you so long?

How do you know this? The relations between sponsor and club are sacrosanct and privy to those within the club only. Anything else is simply outsider speculation. The sponsors would been edgier about matters way before round 1.

A premiership winning coach can. As far as his coaching creds are concerned, atm he has zip. He is a punt.

It may be speculation about sponsorship relations but i bet i am right-which would be an important reason that Gardiner acted. Inactivity would have been far worse.

What premiership coach is available??? Pagan seems to have lost it without a carey player-Sheedy well i don't think he will move. Who else is there????

Mould Voss with TOP ASSISTANTS Be Bold and Pro active-If i am wrong i will cop it-I would hate to see Vossy be successfull somewhere else without giving him a crack

I don't know why others like Alistair Clarkson are coming out in the media and criticising Gardner for doing what he did. Reading the spate of articles in the HUN website about the whole Daniher review affair annoyed me greatly and prompted me to pen those words. I think the comments made earlier being willing to embrace change in order to change our fortunes around was spot on. That's exactly what we need to do. Why dwell in the past when its clear to all and sundry that things are stale, dare I say it almost rotten, at this club in the coaching department? Just because Neale's a nice guy doesn't mean we should jeopardise our opportunity to begin an exhaustive search for the best coach possible to lead us forward with plenty of time up our sleeve before the crunch time of trade week and the national draft are upon us. By waiting until the end of Rd 22 to begin the search for the coach would be crazy on two fronts: 1) gives us very little time to get someone in before trade week, and 2) we might well be competing with a number of other clubs for the leading candidates whereas at the moment we're the only ones with a senior coaching vacancy and the ball is completely in our court to go out there and head hunt the best man available. I believe this is a fantastic position to be in and I commend the board, Gardner, our CEO, and of course Neale himself for bringing this about.

While indeed this is a sentimental time to be a MFC fan (yes I liked Daniher a lot) its really one of the most exciting times that I can remember. Can't wait to see who we end up with. The only problem is that gnawing doubt that sits in the back of my mind that we'll end up with a hack like Chris Connolly. Surely the board couldn't be that blind though....surely.

  why you little said:

It may be speculation about sponsorship relations but i bet i am right-which would be an important reason that Gardiner acted.

Spculate is about it. The current sponsors would have been way onto this before round 1. FWIW the sponsor issues had arrived well before the clubs current moment. An announcement should be made before season's end.

As I understand it, right atm there is no premiership coach available.

  On the Demon bandwagon said:

It doesnt start Monday because our coach next week will not be our coach next year. I do not understand why he had to go however I cant see why it couldnt have waited to next year

Well, goes to show what you know about football, jack [censored].

  On the Demon bandwagon said:

. The season is NOT over and Gardiner promised very publicly that he would wait until then and he didnt end of story

Can you please explain to me how he has gone back on his word? Was Daniher sacked or did he resign? What is wrong with having a review during the season and coming to a conclusion that can be implemented as soon as the season ends? Would you prefer to wait until the end of the season then have a review and then if the conclusion was to seek a new coach start looking for one in January?

All clubs and businesses continually review performance throughout the year, to not do so would be negligent. What you are appearing to be suggesting is that as soon as the word "review" was mentioned Daniher was "sacked" and we all know that is not true. Neale chose to not seek another contract probably because he suspected his contract would not be renewed.

The President has NOT broken his promise and to suggest otherwise is to distort the truth.

PS. Thanks Neale for the effort you have put into the MFC and good luck in the future.