TWELVE months after taking the biggest chance of his coaching career, Nyah-Nyah West United’s Jason Murphy is now a senior premiership coach.
Saturday’s 54 point grand final victory will go down as a coaching masterclass by co-coaches Nick O’Neill and Murphy, with the pair joining forces to lead the Demons to their first seniors premiership since 2001.
It was a performance where everything went right for NNW United, with Murphy admitting as much on 3SH Central Murray Live’s broadcast post-match.
“We had as good a day as we possibly could and we knew we had to bring that to beat a team like Kerang,” Murphy said.
“We worked hard on preparing for them (Kerang) and you could see that everyone was so committed to the plans and the structures that we set up.
“We took a lot away from them and to not concede a goal in the first half, I’ll take that every day of the week.
“I just couldn’t be prouder of our role players, that’s who we are and that’s what our club’s been built on, it’s about doing your job and those boys just stuck to their task all day. They’re playing against higher credentialed footballers, but they stuck to it and beat them and I couldn’t be prouder.”
Kerang went into the match with significantly more finals experience, having played in 14 of the last 18 Central Murray grand finals and winning 10, including the past two.
But it was the younger and less experienced NNW United who were first out of the blocks, with Murphy well aware of the need for his Demons to quickly find their groove.
“We wanted to start well, obviously with our demons from last year’s preliminary final where they came out and kicked eight goals to nothing in the first quarter, all that was in the back of the minds of some of the boys,” Murphy said.
“But we prepared, did everything we needed to do and the way the boys attacked the contest, particularly in the midfield against some really, really good footballers, to get the ball going our way just proves where our boys are at.”
Having crossed over from rival Woorinen at the end of last season, Murphy teamed up with good friend O’Neill, who had previously crossed over from the Tigers 12 months earlier to team up with Corey Daniels in a joint coaching capacity for the 2023 season.
With Daniels stepping down after four seasons in charge of the Demons at the end of last season, it opened up the door for O’Neill and Murphy to end a 23-year premiership drought, with a clear focus on fitness over the off-season the catalyst for NNW United’s charge to this year’s title.
“All those one kilometre runs in 40 degree heat paid off,” O’Neill told 3SH Central Murray Live post-match.
“That finals footy style is the way we want to play, finals footy suits us.
“It really held up today, we held the ball up when we needed too but that run and gun game style helped us.
“Last time we played them (Kerang) we didn’t have me or Alex (Erlandson) up forward and we didn’t have ‘Sav’ (Ethan Saville) or Ethan (Curran) in the midfield, if you put the four of us in any other side, we’ll be pretty hard to beat and so it proved today.”
While the 15.16 (106) to 7.10 (52) victory will be a crowning moment in the careers of Murphy and O’Neill, part of it also belongs to Daniels, who helped bring the club back from the brink after stepping in as interim coach of the Demons mid-season in 2019.
Daniels played in Saturday’s win, his first premiership for his beloved Demons, with the much loved figure lost for words after the game.
“I’m pretty speechless at the moment, it’s been a lot of years of hard work, we’ve been to the bottom and we’ve been able to work our way up and I’m just so proud of everyone involved,” Daniels said.
“It’s everything I could of dreamed of, I’m just proud of everyone, there’s so many people that are apart of this.
“You look back to 2019 and we got flogged every week, but we just stuck together and we’ve gotten here, I’m speechless.
“Last year was the right time for me to step away and these boys (Murphy and O’Neill) have been able to take us that next step and improve us.
“Full credit to them, it’s wonderful and I’m just so happy to be a part of it.”
