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Just the ticket: Bulldog great Chris Grant handing out flyers at Newport station on Thursday. Photo: Eddie Jim
The former captain, club legend and now director of football acknowledged this made for a tricky dance at Newport railway station on Thursday morning, where he handed out vouchers for home-game tickets and urged locals to get on board. Yet he knows the buzz of a few late-season wins is no reason to go overboard.
''While we're encouraged by the last two years and the amount of work that's been put in, we've got nothing to start gloating about,'' Grant said. ''We feel like we're doing it the right way, we believe we're starting to put the jigsaw puzzle together. But that won't play out for a number of years. The reality is we're a bottom-four team still - that's where we finished last year. It's a bit hard to gloat when you're a bottom-four team.''
Grant was part of the selection committee that appointed Brendan McCartney in late 2011, became a director soon after and has since acted as a conduit between the coach and the boardroom, delivering the same message of patience he seeks from fans. He saw winning four of the last six games in 2013 as a snapshot of the future, but cautions that McCartney's plan remains resolutely long-term.
''In a lot of ways the wins last year meant very little to Brendan, but the way we played … when Tom Liberatore's standing in the correct position for longer and the team benefits from that, he gets great pride from that.
Grant listened with nodding agreement as Essendon coach Mark Thompson spoke recently of the 50-game foundation needed for a footballer to learn the game and their part in it. The Bulldogs have 22 listed players whose AFL experience amounts to at least one game but no more than 50 games, with Liberatore (55), Liam Jones (56), Jordan Roughead (57) and Jarrad Grant (58) just past the mark.
''They're games where you're just learning about yourself; you're learning to compete every week, not just one in every four weeks. It's not that they don't mean anything, but they'll be the foundation of your career from then on. You've just got to get those games out of the way.''
Grant well knows the anguish of supporters who are painfully aware that season 2014 marks the 60th anniversary of their team's sole premiership.
Despite his restraint, the 341-game dual Charles Sutton medallist isn't numb to the sense that something is brewing. He can't help but be excited, especially by a game style that has the potential to mount a greater premiership challenge than the teams that made three consecutive preliminary finals from 2008-10.
''I love the way we play around the footy, that's what I'm most excited about,'' Grant said. ''I've always felt we've never won the really big, key moments in finals. We've potentially been good enough, but we haven't won the big moments to get us across the line.''
He recalls the crunch-time efforts of Lenny Hayes for St Kilda, and sees a similar steel building among the Bulldogs. ''We're not leaving early, we're hanging around a bit longer,'' he said.
''Brendan's big starting point is, 'How are we around the footy? What do we look like?' There's an enormous amount of support when someone's got the ball, and when they have the footy it feels like there's a lot more red, white and blue in the thick of it. It feels like we're learning to win the key moments now.
''You can play a breathtaking brand of footy and play in prelims. You can have a reasonable defence and an unbelievable offence and be good enough to make prelims, but it's proven over time that if you're not good around the footy you're not going to win the premiership.
''Finals are about the big moments, and I reckon we're preparing ourselves for those big moments in games.''
McCartney's coaching is underpinned by a philosophy of good people bringing success, which Grant says is evident at every level of the club. He sees Australian football's reluctance to follow other sports in using coaches who didn't play at the elite level as ''a great mystery''.
''Brendan's legacy could be a whole range of things. It could be that we win a premiership with him. It could be that he sets us up for a long-term future. It could be that all the base philosophies that he lives his life by, we live our lives by for ever and a day.
''Our ultimate aim is to have a premiership achieved, and if that ends up coming off, there will be a sense of pride in it, no doubt.''
50-and-under Bulldogs (games played)
Luke Dahlhaus 50 (pictured)
Easton Wood 47
Mitch Wallis 43
Mark Austin 33
Clay Smith 30
Tory Dickson 30
Koby Stevens 30
Tom Young 24
Jason Tutt 19
Ayce Cordy 19
Christian Howard 18
Jason Johannisen 16
Jack Macrae 13
Brett Goodes 13
Michael Talia 13
Tom Campbell 13
Jake Stringer 10
Lachie Hunter 9
Nathan Hrovat 7
Lin Jong 4
Daniel Pearce 5
Fletcher Roberts 2
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-new...#ixzz2tFJ2gbWy
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