McLean's personal quota of 33 possessions, six clearances and five tackles marked what was probably the best performance of his 11-game tenure with the club, in a career that has so far spanned nine seasons and 105 senior appearances in total.
But it ain’t been easy getting there. For example, in reflecting on the lead-in to his previous senior game (the ill-fated fourth round match at the MCG), McLean talked of the difficulties of handling the role of sub. The 26 year-old readily admitted his mind “probably wasn’t where it should have been” given the timing issue - that is, of knowing when to prepare without actually knowing when the call-up happens - and if and when it does, what the on-field role actually entails.
“I don’t want to make excuses, but in saying that, facing the unknown makes it a little bit harder to prepare,” he said. “You obviously want to get fired up at the warm-up, but you don’t want to get fired up too early if you’re not coming on for three quarters... know what I mean?”
But in the countdown to the Melbourne match there was no such ambiguity for the player, who brought a characteristic physical edge to the stoppages with his blocking and various one per centres that have served him so well in the VFL.
“’Ratts’ (Brett Ratten) told me that I was in on the Monday, which was good of him because it allowed me to get my head around it,” McLean said of the call-up for the contest with his old team. “That made a huge difference - one, knowing that I was playing and two, knowing where I was starting. That certainly helped with my preparation and there was no way known I was going to let the opportunity slip.”
McLean was also glowing in his assessment of the manner in which his team rebounded after the indifferent showing the previous Sunday.
“The players copped quite a bit of stick for the loss against Adelaide, so it was more of a relief that we got over the line,” he said. “Good sides find a way to win and while we didn’t play well for the most part we kept grinding away and grinding away, and finally the dam wall broke. We finished with a strong quarter and hopefully we can take that into this week’s game.”
And yes, McLean still found some empathy for the Redlegs.
“You don’t want to see any club going through what Melbourne is going through at the moment,” he said. “I spent a big chunk of my career there, I’m still close to five or six blokes with whom I catch up quite regularly, so it’s hard to watch them going through it. There’s not much more I can say really, they’ve just got to hang tough as much as possible and believe in what they’re trying to achieve because the pendulum swings pretty quickly in AFL.”
It’s of great credit to McLean that he’s managed to call on those same “hang-tough” traits at Carlton in the long weeks leading up to his most recent senior selection.
“Perspective is a word I use quite a bit. It’s a big word for me,” McLean said. “In the past I’ve seen blokes who’ve been in good form, who haven’t got games and have gone away and sulked. That does nothing for the team, nothing for that person.
“The true test of a person’s character is when things aren’t going well and they’re against you a bit. The best way to be is to stay positive and hang in there because you never know when an opportunity presents itself.
“When it’s all said and done, things are never as bad as they seem. There’s always someone worse off. My advice to any players who are down is to get their focus outside the footy bubble. That way they come to realise things are not that grim and they get back to remembering why they play footy in the first place - because they love it so much.”
Crucially, McLean has come off his first uninterrupted pre-season in the past four since undergoing reconstructive surgery on his ankle back in 2008. That continuity through the pre-season, he says, has been of benefit to his mental well-being as much as the physical.
“In the off-season you find that when you do have surgery and you’re put on a pretty testing rehab program that you’re coming into the club on your time off every day,” McLean said. “So when the pre-season rolls around you think to yourself, ‘S..t, I’ve already been here for a month’.”
That said, did McLean consider the Melbourne game as something of a turning point?
“I definitely got a lot of confidence out of that game,” came the reply, “and I’ve always had the confidence and the self-belief”.
“When you haven’t played at that level for a while sometimes the natural human instinct is to question yourself - you know, ‘Am I still up to that standard, having not played AFL for a while?’, so it’s terrific to get that game under the belt.
“But in saying that it’s only one game and I can’t afford to look too far ahead. You hear about quite a lot of footballers playing every game as if it’s their last and that’s a reality for me.”
In the minutes before Saturday night’s match with Port Adelaide at AAMI Stadium, McLean will take that customary moment to ponder the significance of the No.14 guernsey so grandly worn by his grandfather, the 128-gamer from Fawkner, Rod McLean.
“I always take a bit of time out to reflect on ‘Pop’ when I put the No.14 on,” McLean said. “Obviously Carlton is a great club and he played in two premierships for Carlton and was also Chairman of Selectors for a while.
“Pop bled blue, so it’s always good to think of him when I pull on that jumper and run out in the Dark Navy.”
