It’s an extraordinary stat, considering 48 years have lapsed since coach Ken Hands got there. Before that you have to go back a further 53 years, to Norman “Hackenschmidt” Clark, who completed the coaching leg of the double in 1911.
“I knew I was getting closer during the pre-season... but in the lead-up to the first round I didn’t really think about it,” Ratten said from the sanctity of the changerooms.
“Now it’s here and I’ll probably look back on it in later years and realize that’s a great achievement from a personal point of view. But really, at the end of the day, there’s been some great coaches who didn’t play 100 games and (Robert) Walls, (John) Nicholls and (Alex Jesaulenko) who didn’t coach 100 games, all coached premiership teams.”
Hands, now 85, wasn’t mindful of his place in history when contacted this week.
“Gee, 100 of each eh? It’s a statistic that’s never really occurred to me before,” Hands said.
“Hearty congratulations to Brett too. I’m glad he’s getting his name on the coaches locker.”
Ratten meanwhile, when reminded that only Hands and Clark had come before him, said that football as in life “is all about opportunity and timing”.
And when quizzed as to whether the first 100 games as a coach posed greater challenges than the first 100 as a player, Ratten said: “They’re all hard... you’ve just got to work hard at what you do and you need a little bit of luck along the way”.
As a fiercely loyal Carlton person, Ratten is clearly proud of his impending milestone.
“Even as a player it was something that really drove me, to go down in history at the football club and having been a part of it,” he said.
Hopefully the signwriters don’t make the same misjudgment as they did when the boy from Yarra Glen notched game No. 100 for the Blues way back in 1996.
“It was quite funny, when I played my 100th game we had an old bloke who used to come in and put the names up,” Ratten said.
“One day someone said to me ‘Your name’s up’ and I said ‘You beauty’, so I went in and looked at No.7 but my name wasn’t there because the old bloke had put it on No.17 because he confused me with Brent Heaver.
“Hopefully after I coach my 100th game they don’t put my name up on the trainers’ locker and they don’t write B. Rotten.”
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Norman “Hackenschmidt” Clark
Playing record: 126 matches, three goals 1905-1912; premiership player 1906-1907 & 1908
Coaching record: 150 matches for 102 wins, 42 losses and six draws (win/loss ratio 70 per cent) 1912 & 1914-1918; premierships 1914 & 1915
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Ken Hands
Playing record: 211 matches, 188 goals 1945-1957; premiership player 1945 & 1947; best and fairest 1953; captain 1952-1957
Coaching record: 114 matches for 60 wins, 51 losses and three draws (win/loss ratio 65.79) 1959-1964
Brett Ratten
Playing record: 255 matches, 117 goals 1990-2003; premiership player 1995; best and fairest 1995, 1997 and 2000 (tied); captain 2002-2003
Coaching record: 99 matches for 49 wins, 48 losses, one draw (win/loss ratio 52) 2007 -
