WHERE to start after one of the most extraordinary few hours of footy news in recent memory?
Gerard Healy started making noises about a big story breaking out of Fremantle, "involving the coach" at around 6.30pm on his 3AW Sports Today program last night. Francis Leach on SEN also had word of breaking news.
As we noted earlier in the week, you can tell the story is on the money when the 1988 Brownlow Medalist ditches the "Whispers" non de plume and goes with the story himself.
Minutes later the media release filtered through from Fremantle announcing the sudden departure of Mark Harvey as coach and that its announcement on his replacement will be made in "due course".
So forget your processes and your comprehensive nationwide search. Mark Neeld, Scott Burns, Brendan McCartney et al need not apply. Freo had its man already installed and he was likely to be an experienced hand.
Thoughts immediately turned to Rodney Eade, most recently of the Western Bulldogs. But as is the wont of coaches who leave a club late in a season, the media comes calling with offers to serve out the rest of the year and in Eade's case, he was sitting in a studio at The Age, taking part in an online finals preview and he immediately denied that he was set to be Harvey's replacement.
So Jake Niall had the early scoop, and was able to report that development in his breaking story on The Age website about Harvey's sacking.
It was then that attention turned to Ross Lyon and his whereabouts. The St Kilda coach had an offer on the table for a new deal to remain with the Saints, drafted as much as anything, to keep him out of the clutches of the Melbourne Football Club.
All the drive time radio shows in Melbourne have close ties to St Kilda. Bruce Eva lives and breathes the Saints, and produces Sports Today; SEN drive host Francis Leach and evening host Mark Fine are fellow Saints tragics. All had strong lines into the club and were able to get to air reports that Lyon had just walked out on the Saints.
SEN made for great radio, with Fine playing the old-style newsbreaking journo, leaving co-host Nathan Thompson to hold the fort while he placed calls to his contacts.
AW had the added bonus of Brad Hardie, who lives in Melbourne but presents the Western Australian version of Sports Today on 6PR. He was all over Harvey's sacking and was strong that Lyon would be tabbed as his replacement.
Then it was the turn of the TV shows. League Teams on Fox Sports, OneHD's The Game Plan and of course, The Footy Show, spent heaps of time reporting what they knew and speculating on what they didn't.
Of course, The Footy Show had the added attraction of Garry Lyon as host.
Lyon is leading the process to secure Melbourne's new coach and was asked to explain what this meant for the Demons. He was able to finally say that while there was interest in Ross Lyon from Melbourne, the only discussions to date had been with his management at Elite Sports Properties.
And ESP was the final piece in the puzzle, given its management of both Lyon and Harvey. Every media outlet put to air the statement from ESP that it was no longer acting for Lyon given he had gone ahead and instigated discussions to leave the saints for another club without its knowledge.
Lyon, of course, had no other choice because had he brought ESP into his discussions with the Fremantle, ESP would have been duty bound to tell Harvey what was going on.
The commentariat speak
So what are the commentariat saying about all it all?
In The Drum on the ABC website, Gerard Whateley writes that Lyon probably had run his course with the Saints, but the manner of his departure was most undignified.
"He left without a word to his players - a group he had driven, maniacally at times, into a bubble that might have been entirely unhealthy, in the quest for the ultimate."
"Whatever honour Lyon had collected through an industrious and earnest coaching career was shed before he boarded the plane across the country. Ross Lyon’s defection from St Kilda to the helm of Fremantle will stand as the low point on a football landscape riddled with dishonesty and treachery."
In the West Australian, chief football writer Mark Duffield states that it is impossible to judge the last year of Harvey's tenure. Freo won nine games (including just five at home) in an injury-ravaged year, but didn't beat anyone of significance.
"There was clear disquiet from within the club about the consistency of Harvey's methods, and the delivery of his message. There were legitimate questions to be asked about the Dockers' handling of their injury crisis," he wrote.
But Duffield is a longtime respected observer of the West Australian football scene didn't spare Fremantle in his assessment.
"Freo have an unfortunate habit of creating their own ungodly mess, wondering how the hell they got there. Most messes are of their own making, many of their solutions drastic and hard to sell to a success-starved following. It gets harder with every incident like this and they really need to find a room of mirrors and take a long, hard look."
In The Age, Rohan Connolly hailed the boldest move yet made by Fremantle in its 17 years in the AFL. "The Dockers have traditionally been seen as flaky, undisciplined and a little mentally soft, both on and off the field. That will change quickly. In fact, last night's landing of arguably the coaching game's biggest fish is by far the most significant thing Fremantle has achieved in its 17-season AFL history."
Colleague Greg Baum wrote that Lyon's defection was further proof that in modern football, it is every man for himself. "There is no such thing as morality, just results."
Baum also noted that Lyon had to be talked out of quitting St Kilda when the "schoolgirl affair" first came to light last year and then again, when a group of players misbehaved on a pre-season training camp in New Zealand.
Jon Ralph writes in the Herald Sun that the new coach of the Saints will be facing a tough rebuild. "Nick Riewoldt turns 29 tomorrow, Sam Fisher and Justin Koschitzke are already 29, Lenny Hayes will be 32 by next season and Nick Dal Santo will be 28 by next year.
"Brendon Goddard is just entering his peak and Ben McEvoy could be a star," he writes. "But will the next coach be able to extract the same performance from Raph Clarke, Sean Dempster, Ryan Gamble, Clint Jones, Dean Polo, and Zac Dawson?"
Also in the Herald Sun, Mike Sheahan harked back to the good old days when a coach was let go with barely a whisper.
"It is a huge coup for the Dockers, a crushing blow for St Kilda and a smack in the face for Melbourne, which has been linked to Lyon in recent weeks. The Saints will be hugely embarrassed. They have lost the man they have eulogised in recent days as a great coach, a wanted coach, a coach of great integrity."
The views in this article are those of the author and not necessarily the AFL or its clubs
