Tonners on the road to sustained success

“Success is a journey, not a destination.”

It’s an old saying popularised by those ubiquitous ‘Successories’ posters that adorned the walls of so many offices in the early ‘90s.

But there’s a good reason it’s a well-worn saying – because it’s true.

It’s certainly true in sport, despite its renown for viewing success solely through the lens of the destination (wins and losses).

However, anyone involved in sport at any level knows that success can be measured in a myriad of ways, including enjoyment, personal and team growth, relationship building, life lessons and good old-fashioned fun (sport’s original essence).

So, when Old Brighton fell three goals short of Old Scotch on Premier Men’s Grand Final Day, some may have seen 2024 as a failed season for the Tonners. Coach Marcel Bruin isn’t amongst them.

“If you smell the roses, we ultimately won 17 of our 20 matches, so it was an incredibly successful season,” says the man known colloquially around the VAFA as ‘Soup.’

“When you digest the Grand Final in isolation, sure – we didn’t execute as well as we’d like to. We created opportunities and had our chances.”

Bruin was upbeat in his messaging immediately after the game.

“I said to the boys that we’ve had a really successful season, so enjoy that for what it is and don’t feel the need to just wipe the year and move on straight away. Yeah, you’ll feel disappointment. You worked really hard to create this opportunity, but that’s all we did. Ultimately, we didn’t get it done.”

He also pointed to just how far they’ve come, both as a group and individually.

“There’s so much to be proud of,” he reflects.

“A lot of our 19-to-22-year-olds went to another level amongst the talent we already had. Players who have been on our list for a long time evolved. That makes me happy. I love seeing players get better. That’s why I coach. It’s not necessarily about wins and losses. It’s seeing guys grow and sport is a great vehicle for that personal development. It can teach you so many lessons if you’re open to experiencing them and we did this year.”

Bruin learned plenty during his first season as a senior coach after decades of involvement as a player and behind the scenes in the VAFA, VFL and other local leagues. Despite that lifelong experience, the nerves and nagging doubts were there come Round 1.

“It feels like a whirlwind when you’re coaching, but winning that first game against Uni Blues was incredibly gratifying. They’re always a tough team to play, and as a first-time coach, you’re forever wondering whether you’ve done enough, whether you’re good enough, whether your messaging is right, as I don’t have that experience behind me.

“You never quite know and can only judge it on that outcome, so that win broke the shackles for me, and I felt like we did take strides from there. We focused a lot on education, and the impact that had this year was very gratifying. I couldn’t have done it without the great support of my Assistant Coaches Luke Daffy and Josh Homann.”

In 2024, all the work behind the scenes over recent years at Brighton Beach Oval started paying off on the field, with five of their six teams playing finals. The result was three Grand Finals and two premierships (Senior Women’s and Under 19s), plus a Grand Final (Senior Men’s) and valuable finals experience for their Reserves and Thirds Division 3 Men’s South teams.

“I’ve got a broader view on happiness. It comes from so much more than just your own team winning,” says Bruin.

“I got great joy out of watching our women win their first premiership, for example. The excitement they had to play in a Grand Final just lifted the club holistically. Our Under 19s won just our second flag in club history. Both of these teams have created a wonderful legacy for their group.

“We’ve taken such significant cultural steps. The club is so inclusive and enjoyable to be around. People who don’t have any particular direct connection to the club come down to watch and have a beer after the game. That says a lot. We try hard to connect all our teams back at the club as part of our community environment. They all enjoy hanging around with each other.

“All our players have a connection with each other and want to be connected. They genuinely enjoy each other’s company. Football is actually just a by-product – they enjoy doing it, but they enjoy spending time together just as much. It’s a credit to the Committee and others who have nurtured this group in recent years. It leads to a great culture.

“Our connection with Brighton Grammar School is as strong as ever. That gives their students a genuine pathway to playing higher level footy should they aspire to. A massive amount of work has been done on that and it ultimately funnels talent up the pipeline to make it a much easier job for me.

“It’s always been my desire to have our Under 19s included as part of our senior program rather than being separate, because the faster we can develop young players, the better we’ll be as a club with more depth in players who can adapt to senior footy faster.”

2024 VAFA Rising Star Jonah Campigli provides the perfect case study, having played the first half of 2024 in the Under 19s before earning his chance at senior level and grabbing it with both hands. He’s now training with St Kilda and Sandringham over the summer.

Marcel hasn’t yet been able to bring himself to watch the Grand Final in its entirety.

“My immediate thoughts in the days after the game were ‘What did I do that contributed to the result? What can I do to be better?’

“I watched the second quarter back to see what happened, as the stats were overwhelmingly in our favour, but we kicked 5.8. I wanted to look at how that came about and what we did and didn’t do. I ended up watching it with my head in my hands! Why did we do this or that? It’s out of our control now, but we’ll take great learnings out of it.

“We were a first-year coaching program, but now, in our second year, we can coach more finely and focus on certain areas of our gameplan to home in on what’s really important within those phases. Where do we need to focus and educate? How can we be better? How can we make the game easier? That will impact outcomes.”

Lessons learned on Grand Final Day have already been acted upon.

“Credit to Old Scotch, we had a couple of vulnerable areas personnel-wise. Namely, we were underdone in our key backs, and their key forwards got hold of us. Sam Flockart had a great year as an undersized ruck, but they got us there as well. We were skinny in those two areas, and it came home to roost on Grand Final Day.

“So, we’ve already addressed those areas for 2025. Darcy Gilbert, who played the first half of 2024 before getting injured at work, returns to slot into the key defensive role, so we’ll be more cohesive as a defensive unit. Plus, we’ve got Sam’s older brother Felix back to boost our ruck stocks. Two key needs filled.

“We’ve also got Luca Macnab and Jamie Hope full-time, plus Archi Manton has nominated us as his home club. He’ll be just the second player on our list who isn’t an ex-BGS boy, after Sam Collins. Archie came to us via his connection with Felix at Port Melbourne.

“So, the talent is still all there. We lost Tom Howard, who played 6 or 7 games, but we’ve lost no one else & gained some, including talent from our Under 19 premiership group. We have a great mindset and attitude, so the base is there for us to continue to work on.”

“As for expectations and goals for 2025, we haven’t discussed them as a group yet. We’ll do that at our pre-season camp in early February. My expectation will be around playing the way we want to play, which is a typical coach answer.

“We want to get better in particular areas – we’ll want to defend as strongly and aggressively as we can to force turnovers in good areas to make offence easier. We’ll want to be able to really test teams with our speed on the ball and will spend a lot of time on that as we didn’t do that on Grand Final Day. We’ll take the game on and use our youthful exuberance and keep working on being able to do all of that under pressure.”

Having lost two of the past three Grand Finals, the Tonners will take nothing for granted.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do to get that Grand Final opportunity again. We needed to fill a couple of gaps and have done that. Of course, you need some luck – we were healthy last year, and will hopefully be again. With what we’ve got, we should be aiming to play in September.

“We have a very mature group. Yes, the end to 2024 was a huge disappointment, but there’s no lingering negativity. I don’t think any of them are looking at it as fuel to take the additional step in 2025. It’s all about recognition of how we can be better.

“That will once again be led by the man at top, Harry Hill, who was cruelly unable to play in the Grand Final. He really battled with it, but he shelved that disappointment and didn’t let it show but privately, I know he was so disappointed.

“He will use that to continue driving our group. He’s got a lot of footy left, but he knows it’s difficult to get to Grand Finals, and as you get older, you’ve got to take advantage of them because you never know if you will get there again.

“He’s incredibly motivated to get the best out of our group. We’re not outcome-driven because if we focus on getting the best out of our group, we know where it will end up. So, let’s make sure we’re prepared, our game plan is right, we’re doing the right things & playing the right way.

“We have a massive opportunity moving forward over the next few years. Clarkey (President Tom Clarke) and I want to set this program up for sustained success.

“I’m rapt to coach a club I played at and have invested so much time into as a player and supporter. I’m so grateful for them taking a massive chance on a guy who hasn’t coached a football club before. It turned out well, and I’ll do everything in my power to continue on this pathway.”