The young players have been the story at Fremantle, how have you assessed the side's development with that group on board?
It's just been good to see the progression. It's a shame we haven't had our second-year players like (Chris) Mayne, (Rhys) Palmer and those sorts of guys up enough to be with the first-year players, but (Nic) Suban and (Stephen) Hill have played every game, which is a credit to them – not many first-year guys do that. Then you bring in some of our rookies like (Matt) de Boer, (Greg) Broughton, (Clancee) Pearce, (Luke) Pratt and they've been really important for us to press forward with our development.

What has being in charge of this young group done for you as a coach?
It gives you an insight into whether your decision-making on a lot of those guys was right. It shows you what you need to do to make them a complete AFL player and, more importantly, what is the experience actually doing for them? Are they learning from every game they play? And are they going to be a part of your next successful team?

To construct a bit of a timeline, when you arrived at Fremantle, what would you say your coaching strengths were then?
Being able to give the group an insight into how to play the game and how to pick through the game. As well as having a successful playing career – that always holds you in good stead to make the group understand what you need to do to be successful. Then hopefully having the right game plan that will play to the strengths of your playing group and get you to where you need to get to.

Where did developing young players fit into you resume at that point?
I think that's pretty high up on my agenda. It's been a good trait that I've always been able to excel young players and get their talent out of them, if you know what I mean.

The injuries you've been hit with – are they such a bad thing reflecting on where the club is?
The positive is it gives opportunities to guys, sometimes a little bit prematurely. What you want is your young players performing at the lower level regularly before they get a game. Our hand has been a little bit forced because of some impact injuries, more than anything, but there'll be one day where I'll get them all together and they'll play on the same park together – our best 22 that is. Now our best 22 has changed probably because of the opportunity we've had to play younger players. All of a sudden we've got a bit of an insight into perhaps where they're ranked on the list. With a bit of luck at some stage we might have them all out there playing, but it won't be this year when we've got (Ryan) Crowley and Palmer out for the season.
 
So with that changing order in the 22, is there a bit of a selection squeeze on the way with players coming back?
That's the ideal situation, but we haven't been in that position yet.

So what will then be the overriding selection policy for the rest of the season?
It would be playing our best players. With a little bit of progressing the experience of our young players' careers – guys that we know will be here for a long time. A bit of a balance.

Will guys on the fringe get a chance to stake their claims as things like list assessment become more pressing?
That becomes more pressing probably in your last couple of games more so than now, but we have an extensive injury list that maybe suggests we'll have to play another young player in the next month.

Your position? Having been in the driver's seat with this young group and seeing them improve, do you feel like you've mounted a strong case to see them through to the next stage?
Well I'm contracted until the end of next year and my whole review basically will be based on how I'm developing this young team. It doesn't necessarily revolve around win/loss, but you'd certainly need to be making sure the team is heading in the right direction. As funny as it sounds, with three wins and all that we've just gone through, it was going to be a difficult year. But the pride in me, my competitiveness as a coach and what I've tried to instil in the playing group, we want to win more regularly than we have been.

Do you feel that you've now stamped your style and your coaching beliefs on this side?
That evolves with the playing group and the young players, their attitude and how they think about and approach football. But what you want your group to be is obsessive and relentless in their approach to your game plan and winning. And then you introduce the smarts. What I mean by that is the smarts in the game that are going to hold you above the opposition.

The club. What do you think Fremantle has done this season to earn respect and build some culture?
I think our effort and our competitiveness has been accepted in some way, shape or form and a lot of the decision-making at the end of last year has been justified with the changing of the list and the changing of the guard. I'd like to think that people respect the courage of all of those decisions by the club particularly.

So how important has that off-field backing been in the way you've gone about coaching this season?
Your board, your football staff, your CEO, even our sponsorship and marketing, they've all got to be behind what you're doing. And we're growing, we're growing as a football club more so than when we inducted into the AFL in 1995. This is the first time the club's made a conscious decision since then to go this way (with youth).

The rest of the season. How will you measure the success of the last 11 rounds?
Just by the demeanour of the group and the way that they approach every game. That's really all you can do. Making sure that we are at the forefront of games the majority of the time, we're showing initiative and we're never showing any acceptance of losing. That's the belief that we are running with.

Are you optimistic?
Yeah I am. I just can't wait until we get a few of those players, and (Hayden) Ballantyne is one that I haven't spoken about too much, and Mayne and these sorts of guys. Get them all together and wound up, because if I put our best side up for you at the moment, it's actually quite exciting. And when we go to the draft at the end of the year we’re going to have that depth.

Are you then willing to put expectations on what they can achieve next season?
No, because players between 0-50 games fluctuate and we're going to have a number of those players. What I would say is you're going to see a young group and an older group gel together a lot more with the experience of playing games together.

Developing the side into a premiership contender, what timeline do you see for that with where your skipper and ruckman are at in their careers, and key players Roger Hayden and Paul Hasleby?
It's what I call building and the timeline is in the next couple of years. It is those guys and (Luke) McPharlin, (Chris) Tarrant, (Antoni) Grover and (Des) Headland as well. But the beauty of our list is we don't necessarily have to make a decision on age at the end of the year, that's been done last year. It's more about youth and who the right players are to keep on this list to build this team up.