AFTER 10 years you might think you’d get sick of having just the one coach, but it’s the complete opposite for me.

I’m rapt that Choco is going to be my coach, hopefully, for the rest of my career.

It was a relief on Tuesday to learn that he’s going to be our coach for the next two years and to remove all the uncertainty hanging around the place.

I was getting physio when Kane came in and told me the news.

Kane had texted Choco a few times on Monday night to try and find out what was going on, but Choco didn’t know himself until after 10pm.

I’m not sure who told Kane in the end, but we knew by 9:30 Tuesday morning and when I saw Choco half an hour later he was pretty pumped up.

The whole situation was just getting annoying because any player that went up for any kind of interview was having to answer questions about Choco’s future.

After you get asked the same question 20 times, it does wear on you and Choco said that himself when he met with all the players and staff on Tuesday.

He said he was sick and tired of talking about it and that he could now just concentrate on coaching and trying to get the team back into the top eight.

I don’t know how he did it, but Choco was really good in the weeks leading up to the announcement.

He really tried to promote a positive attitude around the place and that was pretty difficult after the big loss to the Western Bulldogs.

He changed training around a fair bit to make the club a fun place to be around when it really could’ve gone the other way.

If he was stressed he wasn’t showing it. He admitted on Tuesday that he was pretty worried about his future, so it’s a huge weight off his shoulders.

I’ve never heard one player say a bad word about Choco. Everyone that I spoke to about it wanted him to be re-signed.

I heard members of the general public, including some of our own supporters, saying it was ‘time for a change’ and time to bring in someone new.

I find that in terms of our supporters, like most clubs, we have a core group who will stick with you through thick and thin, no matter how the team is going - those supporters are amazing.

But another section of supporters - you could call them fairweather - love you and the coach when the team is flying, but when times get tough they tend to jump off and resort to criticising the coach and the players.

Our loyal supporters are behind Choco and that’s what we want.

At no stage has he been boring or have I thought that it was time for a change and that’s a great credit to him.

Choco changes his coaching style and he definitely doesn’t get stale.

He learns from the best overseas coaches in rugby, NFL and soccer and he’s got Dean Laidley flying over soon to talk about what North Melbourne does and how they go about things. He’s always trying to improve.

It’s well known that Choco and I didn’t really get along when I first got to the club.

He saw the potential in me, but I was pretty soft.

I didn’t really have a second effort and lacked the competitiveness that he wanted to see.

Now, I like to think I play pretty competitive, life or death football and that’s all because of Choco.

The views in this story are those of the author and not necessarily those of the AFL or the clubs.