When the newly-appointed Carlton captain Marc Murphy leads his players onto Etihad Stadium for tonight's NAB Cup Grand Final against Brisbane, watching on with interest will be another former captain and noted wearer of the No.3 Navy Blue guernsey, the AFL Commission Chairman Mike Fitzpatrick.
Fitzpatrick, now in his sixth year at the helm of League football’s governing body, sported the No.3 into 150 senior matches for the Blues between 1974 and ’83. A club champion in 1979, he was also an integral member of the Premiership teams of 1979, 1981 and 1982, the last two as Carlton captain.
Reminding that he’ll be casting a judicious eye over the Grand Final as a neutral observer, Fitzpatrick was quick to congratulate Murphy in becoming the 48th man to captain the Carlton Football Club since Jimmy Aitken in its maiden VFL season of 1897.
“You can quote me as saying I think it’s terrific that the No.3 is once again in the role of captain where it belongs,” Fitzpatrick said.
Of course, Fitzpatrick gained the captaincy from Alex Jesaulenko in far more turbulent circumstances than the 142-game Murphy did from Chris Judd. The Rhodes Scholar assumed leadership responsibilities after Jesaulenko and Carlton President George Harris were overthrown in a bitter power struggle in 1980 and as he conceded: “I hope Marc’s first year as captain is a lot more fun than mine was”.
Not surprisingly, Fitzpatrick has closely followed Murphy’s playing career, even before his calling as Carlton’s priority selection (first overall) of the 2005 national draft.
“I saw him at the Oakleigh Chargers actually where he was a very good player. He played with my son Will and even there he looked the part. You didn’t necessarily notice him that much but at the end of the day he’d have three goals and a hell of a lot of touches and you’d think back on the game and say ‘Well overall he’s one of the best players on the ground’.
“I wasn’t surprised he went early in the draft. He was unlucky in the first year he got tackled at the GABBA, which was pretty rugged, and he got put out for most of the year. Since then he’s hardly put a foot wrong really. Early on you could argue that his defensive game was ‘so so’, but that’s true of nearly all the young guys when they start, and now he’s turned into a really complete player who at his age is obviously nearing his peak.”
So had Carlton got it right in naming Murphy? Fitzpatrick believes so, despite not being part of the inner sanctum.
“You’d have to get a feel for the internal dynamic I think, and obviously they’ve thought pretty hard about it,” came the reply.
“But what is leadership about? Number one it’s about good performance on the field, number two it’s about performing when times get tough - and when the question’s been asked he’s been one of the few who’s got his shoulder to the wheel – and then to some extent it’s about representing the players with the coaching staff at the club. Knowing him (Murphy) a bit I think he’d stand up here.”
That said, Fitzpatrick believed Murphy will be well-equipped to meet the many and varied challenges the captaincy will invariably throw at him, as he himself discovered when he assumed leadership of the Carlton team more than 30 years ago.
“You’ve got extra responsibility. You’ve got a job when you’re on the ground to pick up the pieces when things go wrong with guys and getting in behind them and supporting them, rather than getting stuck into them. That’s probably the key thing,” Fitzpatrick said.
“It (the captaincy) is about having a little bit more presence out on the ground without thinking about your own game. What I found with that was that it actually made me a much better player. My defensive game got a lot better and because you’re getting around and supporting the other players you had this extra dimension - and in a way it drove you as well.
“What you see with some players is that the captaincy weighs on them a bit, whereas with others it actually makes them more complete and I think that’s what we’ll see here.”
Follow Tony De Bolfo on Twitter: @CFC_DeBolfo
