But they no doubt sit prominently among the memories Mark Thompson was referring to when the Geelong coach casually turned to his skipper Tom Harley, mid-response, and asked: “We’ve had a lot of tough years, Tommy, haven’t we?”
It is those “tough years” that are driving this Geelong group in its bid for back-to-back premierships.
Thompson said his team had been super at guarding against complacency and external pressure this season as it has racked up win after win on its way to a 21-1 record.
The Cats head into September the hottest flag favourite in history, although judging by what the coach says about his players, that might not bother them.
Lumped with the burden of winning last year’s season decider by the greatest ever margin, and with a town ecstatic after its team won its first premiership in 44 years, Thompson was posed the question of whether he was worried about his men dropping off in 2008.
“That’s what everybody talks about, isn’t it … that you can’t sustain it?” Thompson said.
“It hasn’t been an easy thing. To win a premiership is an enormous thing and everybody’s goal, so to be able to repeat the sort of year that these guys have done has just been outstanding.”
So what has been the catalyst in keeping the Cats juggernaut rolling along at such a frenetic pace?
“We’ve just never forgotten what it’s like (the tough times) and I think that we show a lot of respect for the game, and it annoys us when people say that we don’t show respect and we’re not humble,” he said.
“All we are is, we’re just out there just trying to achieve the best result we can.”
Even the club’s supporters seemed to have eased off in their expectations, allowing for a pretty comfortable environment down at Sleepy Hollow.
“I thought that would have been one of the great challenges, just handling the expectation,” Thompson said.
“Clearly, it certainly hasn’t been there, I thought it would have been a much more difficult job.
“I think our supporters are just pretty happy with what they’ve got in their team and I think the players really know what to do and how good they are and they’ve been just fantastic to work with.
“Generally I thought that we might have had a lot more work to do in that area but we haven’t.”
