‘Couldn’t be more ready’: Fraser details Blues ambition
Oliver Caffrey |
After an extraordinary 13-week stint as Carlton’s interim coach, Josh Fraser feels he couldn’t have been more ready to become the Blues’ full-time leader.
Following a fairytale rise from 1-8 when Michael Voss exited as coach, Fraser was the unanimous choice to steer the club forward on a three-year contract.
The former Collingwood and Gold Coast ruckman has won 10 of 13 games to guide Carlton into the most unlikely of finals appearances.
Sunday’s draw against the Western Bulldogs sealed the Blues’ spot in the top 10, with the club’s board meeting to finalise Fraser’s appointment on Monday.
The results gave him the edge on untried assistants Jaymie Graham (Fremantle), Corey Enright (St Kilda) and James Kelly (Geelong), who all loomed strongly and presented to the coaching panel before Fraser did.
When becoming interim coach, Fraser immediately ruled himself out of contention to stay in the role next year as a way to take pressure off the club.
The calm strategy helped pave the way for one of the most remarkable in-season turnarounds in VFL/AFL history.
“I’ve had this ambition for a long period of time of wanting to be a senior coach, and ultimately, when you’re in that position as an assistant or a development coach with the ambition, you never quite know if that’s going to be afforded to you,” Fraser said on Tuesday.
‘Ultimately, I felt like I couldn’t have been more ready in the end.
“Not to say that I don’t think I’ve got opportunities to keep growing and developing myself, but when I took all the information on board, had the conversations I needed to, got the opportunity to experience the role to some degree as an interim, I was really strong in realising I was ready.”
Even though he spent the majority of his playing career at the Magpies, Fraser’s coaching journey has been largely at the old enemy.
The 44-year-old has had two stints as an assistant at Carlton, while also leading the club’s VFL team.
Blues chief executive Graham Wright, also a former Collingwood person, brought Fraser back to the club at the end of last season.
“I don’t think we envisaged this,” Wright said of his mindset when Fraser returned to Carlton.
“I’d had been a part of Josh’s journey at Collingwood for three or four years and had seen the growth in him from a development point of view.
“Also to coach his own team, so we’re really keen to get him across to play a role with Michael (Voss) at the end of last year.
“That was the role that he was playing up until we tapped him on the shoulder and asked him to consider this as an interim.”
Wright also said Fraser was the standout candidate during the process, not even factoring in his impressive win-loss record.
Carlton will face ladder-leaders Fremantle at Marvel Stadium on Saturday, with a win potentially setting up a monster wildcard clash with the Pies.
AAP