The irony of Neale Daniher is that since he became non-verbal his voice has got louder.
A journalist and noted after-dinner speaker agreed once to address an AFL team and he asked how long he should speak for. Fifteen minutes? Twenty? He was told, “if you hold them for five, you are Churchill”.
Melbourne captain Max Gawn relishes the chance to catch up with Neale Daniher before the annual Big Freeze match on the King’s birthday public holiday.Credit: Eddie Jim
Australian of the Year and FightMND campaigner Daniher spoke – through his technology and his daughter Bec – at length with Melbourne players this week. They were in thrall.
He has spoken annually to the Melbourne players, and indeed to those at Collingwood ahead of the Big Freeze match, and he regularly talks to other clubs, too. No one tunes out. His ability to resonate has got keener.
Melbourne captain Max Gawn said while Daniher’s one-liners had changed over the years, the fundamental message he delivered had not.
“They’re all relatively inspirational, but similar at the same time. They are about team before me. He is the definition of selfless, which is great for the football world,” Melbourne captain Max Gawn said.
Daniher talking to Melbourne’s players last Tuesday.Credit: Eddie Jim
“He’s literally fighting the disease (motor neurone disease), and he won’t win, but just so others can succeed from it. That is the definition of selfless.
“He partners his messages up with stuff like this one, which is ‘live it forward’, which is great, which is forward planning, ‘be your best self’. They’re all great messages.
“In 2021, in the grand final, we had him all over our walls. He’s got an absolute belter of a quote that I said in my captain’s speech pre the grand final. It’s ‘when all is said and done, more is said than done. The mark of a man is not what he says, but what he does’.
“That quote there was literally the last sentence that I said before the boys went to their position in the ’21 granny, and it was all over our walls. You get this guy who comes in, who’s incredibly inspirational he’s got our attention every time he talks.”
There was opportune timing to Daniher’s speech to the Demons this year, coming as their season teeters. After being winless for five rounds, they won five of their next seven games, but have left themselves with little margin for error for the rest of the season.
The turnaround after five losses was partly built on that message of selflessness and changing focus from outcome to being happy they had achieved what they set out to.
“Footy is an interesting sport where we get coded, we get rated by the media, on our stats, on our kicks, marks, handballs. It’s hard not to be selfish at different points because you get crucified if you don’t get enough of the ball,” Gawn said.
“If you have got this mentor behind us in Neale that just reminded us not to go down that path and the greater good is to work as a team. I think it’s an incredibly healthy balance, not just when they’re running out there on grand final day.”
After those first five losses to start the season, Gawn said the temptation was to imbue each match, and this marque game in particular, with more importance. But he said the team’s relative change of fortune came from not having that focus.
“I am sure Melbourne supporters would love me to say this is a massive game in the scheme of things, and we want to get to some great football in September, and that’s the goal, that’s the focus. But the goal and the focus is literally to be happy with what we put out on the football field because that’s not what we were doing in the first five weeks, and that’s how we changed our form around.
“We want to be able to look each other in the eye, be happy with and content with what we’re putting out on the football field. In our two losses in that period, the second one (last round against St Kilda); we weren’t happy with anything we put out there.
“With the Hawthorn (loss in round nine), we were happy with some of the football we put out there. The last quarter we fell away, but we could look each other in the eye and say, ‘We gave that a three-and-a-half-quarter effort’.
“But that will happen. There’ll be times we’re not going to win 14 in a row. There’s going to be losses. It’s just important that we can look each other in the eye and say that we gave what Goody told us to do; a fair crack.”
And they did what Neale silently said: It’s not about you, it’s about others.
