BRENDAN McCartney says the transition from Paul Roos to Simon Goodwin has been smooth, with the new senior coach seamlessly fitted into the role.

McCartney, the club’s player/coach performance manager, said Goodwin hadn’t changed too much, when he was senior assistant coach under Roos for 2015-16.

“He hasn’t had to do anything greatly different. I know he’s busier. Being senior coach – it’s very easy to do less coaching. You get to that position, because you can teach the game and coach the game, and then you end up not having the time or the opportunity to do it, but he’s doing it (coaching),” he told melbournefc.com.au.

McCartney said Goodwin was “at pains” to make sure he was coaching the players, such as sitting down with them one-on-one and watching clips of training/playing.

“He also finds time one afternoon a week for one-on-one catch-ups with them, which is a great initiative and I know the players are enjoying it,” he said.

“But credit to Roosy and Josh [Mahoney] that the transition has been quite smooth because Simon was doing a lot of the coaching last year.

“One of Roosy’s great legacies was to let the coaches, not take charge of the game style, but drive the game style, with his guidance. So there has been very little adjustment, apart from slightly different delivery and a different senior coach standing in front of them. The program has rolled on, which has been terrific.”

Now into the second half of pre-season, McCartney said the training before Christmas was intense. 

“Pre-season has been full-on and you don’t have as much time in the week available, so every day is jam-packed, but that’s a good thing,” he said.

“Traditionally, it’s that time of the year that can drag on a bit, where it’s about building a fitness base, but what we’ve also made sure we’ve done is introduce new themes and new concepts, which has kept the players engaged and involved.

“There has been a lot of education – a lot of small group education – around different parts of the game and a lot of that has been built over the last few years.

“With Simon becoming the coach and ingraining more of his own philosophies, there are some great things being put in place and it’s about fine-tuning them now and taking the next level. That’s what most people talk about – finding the next level.”

In terms of his role for 2017, McCartney said it was “pretty broad and encompassing”.

“In the main, it’s to help ensure that the program we have is giving the players the best opportunity to learn and develop how we want them to play,” he said.

“That’s not just in a footy sense – that’s keeping an eye on their wellbeing off the field, with the staff we’ve employed there, their physical development and how they’re coping with footy. Those three areas – football, physical and personal – combined with the mental component of being able to deal with the demands of high level sport, really does determine, as well as their talent, how well they progress and how well they endure.

“It’s also about helping the coaches coach – not telling them what to do or what to say, but guiding their meetings and looking at our drills and finding different ways to tinker with them and modify them, so they give us the best result in a two-hour window on a Monday.

“You need to use every minute and not waste any minute, so time’s precious and we have a group that’s so willing to learn and is so receptive to getting better that it’s brilliant to come to work with them every day with them.”