THE ACRIMONIOUS split between former Melbourne vice-captain Cameron Bruce and his club of 11 years has brought one of the great conflicts of modern football into sharp relief.
What value should a club place on long service when such displays of loyalty could potentially compromise its bid to break a 46-year premiership drought?
Bruce will seek a new footballing home in the NAB AFL Draft after the Demons refused to budge on their offer of a one-year contract.
The 31-year-old reportedly believes a decade of consistently excellent form has earned him the right to at least an option to continue in 2012, while the club insisted it would reassess his worth at the end of 2011.
Given Melbourne's recent penchant for pensioning off its older players, it's hard to argue with Bruce's pessimism about securing another contract.
Since Dean Bailey took the helm at the end of 2007, all of Adem Yze, Jeff White, Russell Robertson, Matthew Whelan, Paul Wheatley and James McDonald have been nudged into retirement - some more forcefully than others.
Bruce will be 32 at the end of next season; of the Demons' recent retirees, only McDonald was offered the opportunity to go on beyond that age.
Players are well within their rights to protect their own interests and prolong their earning capacity in a career that lasts a maximum of 12 or 13 years if they're fortunate.
But what does Bruce's reluctance to play on with the Demons in 2011 say about his confidence in his own ability to demand another deal?
Melbourne's policy of offering only one-year contracts to players aged 30-plus has been established for a number of years. It's not as though the framework for negotiation was a surprise for Bruce and his manager, Ricky Nixon.
If he repeated the efforts of his 2008 club champion year - and there is nothing to suggest such feats are beyond him, based on his 2010 form - then it is nonsense to suggest he would be thrown on the scrapheap for the sake of promoting an untried 18-year-old.
No doubt the raft of youngsters clamouring for a place in Melbourne's best 22 has brought a degree of pressure to bear on Bruce's position that hasn't existed for much of the past four years.
He has also struggled on occasion to execute the skills required under Bailey's game plan; conversely, his ability to win one-on-one contests is unmatched among his Demon peers.
Clearly, it's no fait accompli that a new contract would be forthcoming at the end of 2011 and for that reason, Bruce can easily justify his decision to leave.
What the timing of his decision says about the relationship between player and club is another matter altogether. The Demons will effectively lose one of their best players for an extra pick in the rookie draft - hardly an equitable outcome.
However, a premiership drought that is rapidly approaching the half-century mark has had the wonderful effect of concentrating the minds of the club's administration on the task at hand.
One of the club's recently adopted mottos is 'Whatever it takes'. The quartet of Bailey, football manager Chris Connolly, CEO Cameron Schwab and president Jim Stynes have made no apologies for adhering to it as they pursue the club's 13th premiership.
A few noses have been put out of joint along the way -and there will likely be more to come - but it's difficult to imagine any complaints from the Demon faithful if the grand old flag once again flies over the MCG on the last day of the season.
The views in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of the clubs or the AFL.
