{"id":624065,"date":"2026-04-22T18:24:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T18:24:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/624065\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T18:24:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T18:24:13","slug":"from-the-pocket-ross-lyon-gives-an-unvarnished-view-of-afl-reality-but-too-often-punches-down-st-kilda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/624065\/","title":{"rendered":"From the Pocket: Ross Lyon gives an unvarnished view of AFL reality but too often punches down | St Kilda"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ross Lyon\u2019s press conferences are typically a mix of battery and flattery. On any given day, you\u2019ll get smart-arsery, hostility, humility, occasional mirth and genuine insight. Sometimes, he will provide a 10-minute explanation of how the game was won or lost. Sometimes, he\u2019s playful and rhetorical. Sometimes, he\u2019ll cock his head and look at the questioner like they have no business even being in the same room as him.<\/p>\n

The St Kilda<\/a> coach has been criticised for the way he responded to a set of perfectly reasonable questions in Adelaide last weekend. \u201cDo you have a sense of where you\u2019re at in the context of the season?\u201d was one of them. He didn\u2019t exactly react like Bob Hawke to Richard Carleton\u2019s \u201cimpertinence\u201d in 1983. But it was a typical Lyon response \u2013 part superciliousness, part drollery, part deflection. It was nothing, really. The journalist handled it well, and the coach didn\u2019t cross the line.<\/p>\n

But his club president then weighed in and didn\u2019t exactly help. \u201cIt\u2019s a pretty tough situation we put coaches in \u2013 you have a one-point loss, you don\u2019t have much luck in the running, and you\u2019ve got to front an interview,\u201d Andrew Bassat told the ABC. \u201cI think Ross is much better with good questions than he is with bad questions. \u2018Ask stupid questions, win stupid prizes,\u2019 is his view. I think if he gets an intelligent and fair question, he\u2019ll respond to it fairly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ross Lyon can be funny but there\u2019s been recent incidents where he\u2019s crossed the line. Photograph: Mark Brake\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

For a start, it was comical to hear the founder of Seek straying into \u201cpoor us\u201d territory over the idea of Lyon having to front the media after a loss. Few people in the history of the game have more regularly preached what a pitiless industry footy is. \u201cThe most uncompromising business in Australia,\u201d Lyon called it earlier this year, which anyone working in hospitals, schools, airports, prisons, restaurants or dozens of other professions would have had a quiet chuckle at. To call for restraint, empathy and fairer questions was a bit rich.<\/p>\n

It was also a good example of the standing Lyon has at his club. He\u2019s been handed a level of power that\u2019s almost unprecedented in the modern game. In terms of the long-term strategic direction, media messaging and even the appointment of key personnel, he\u2019s pretty much running the show. He gets an equally good run from the mainstream media. He\u2019ll mumble something mildly amusing, they\u2019ll cross back to the panel shows (which often feature several of his former players and media colleagues) and they\u2019ll be laughing like Basil Fawlty has just goose-stepped into a dining room.<\/p>\n

But Lyon and those employing and protecting him want to be careful that he doesn\u2019t stray into untouchable territory. There\u2019s been several recent incidents where he\u2019s crossed that line. The first was a press conference last year where he struck a tone with AFL<\/a> reporter Gemma Bastiani that he never would have with a male journalist. There was a sneering exasperation to him, an assumption, as always, that he was the smartest person in the room. But she was well prepared and handled the encounter a lot better than he did.<\/p>\n

The coach\u2019s press conference performances are an exercise in buying more time. Photograph: Matt Turner\/AAP<\/p>\n

The other was a line from last month: \u201cIf you want normal, you step the other side of this microphone, the other side of the fence, on the ground, and you pursue mediocrity in your life.\u201d The reporters who trekked out to Moorabbin did so in good faith, asking the same question that is being asked on every panel show, on every St Kilda focused podcast, and in every pub. And Lyon was so precious and so boorish that he immediately went into his \u201ccornered rat\u201d routine.<\/p>\n

Lyon\u2019s grizzled worldview has its place in footy. He offers an unvarnished view on the realities of what this dog eat dog competition is. Sometimes you read the social media banter between clubs and you could be forgiven for thinking it\u2019s a garden party. But it\u2019s a knife fight. It\u2019s central to everything Lyon says and believes. So much of what we hear from coaches is carefully massaged and workshopped, an exercise in brand management. It\u2019s important to know that they\u2019re not all Ted Lasso. There\u2019s a lunatic in all of them, and it\u2019s good to see that reality occasionally.<\/p>\n

His view, and it\u2019s got merit, is that the wider commentariat is lazy when it comes to St Kilda, and that we revert to cliche when it comes to his teams. But his press conferences are an exercise in buying more time, in protecting his players and in igniting a few spotfires. It has worked for three years now. It can be funny. It keeps everyone on their toes. And it gets people talking about his club. But so much of it is a punch down. \u201cAsk stupid questions, win stupid prizes,\u201d may well be his view. But with his team still marooned in footy\u2019s lower middle classes, it\u2019s a view that\u2019s wearing increasingly thin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ross Lyon\u2019s press conferences are typically a mix of battery and flattery. On any given day, you\u2019ll get…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":624066,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[64,63,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-624065","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/624065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=624065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/624065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/624066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=624065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=624065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=624065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}