Paul Roos (Australian rules footballer) : biography
Paul Roos (born 27 June 1963) is a former Australian rules footballer who represented and in the Australian Football League (AFL) during the 1980s and 1990s.
A versatile key position player, Roos was a strong mark who was excellent at ground level, and in his prime was rated the best footballer in Australia.Holmesby and Main, 2011, p. 739 He was one of Fitzroy’s finest players in its final years, and was named at centre half back in Fitzroy’s Team of the Century. In his 17 seasons of League football, he was only reported once, for abusive language, and was found not guilty.
Roos was inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame in 2005. He has won many accolades throughout his career: he was named All-Australian seven times; received the league’s most valuable player (MVP) award; and represented Victoria on 14 occasions in State of Origin. He is also the AFL/VFL record holder for the number of games played wearing the number 1 jumper – which he wore throughout his 356-game career at both Fitzroy and Sydney.
After finishing up as a player, Roos went on to become a successful coach at Sydney, guiding the Swans to the 2005 premiership, their first in 72 seasons.
Early life
Roos grew up in the Melbourne suburb of Donvale and played junior football with Beverley Hills Football Club in Doncaster East. He attended Whitefriars College from 1975 until 1981. As Beverley Hills was in ‘s recruiting zone, Roos was selected to play for Fitzroy in their Under 19’s team.
Coaching career
USA
When his career ended, Roos spent some time in the United States and coached the national side to victory over Canada. He is often credited as one of the key people in the success of the fledgling United States Australian Football League, establishing networks with key people in the US.
Sydney Swans
Returning to Australia and the Swans, Roos then became an assistant coach to Rodney Eade. Part-way through the 2002 season, with the Swans’ record getting worse by the week, Eade was sacked. The club administration started the search for a new coach and it is widely believed that negotiations with Terry Wallace were at an advanced stage. Nevertheless, when Eade finally went with several games of the minor round still to be played, Roos was appointed caretaker coach for the remainder of the 2002 season, a move hugely popular with Swans fans, who remembered his great contribution to the club as a player.
As caretaker coach, Roos immediately transformed the dispirited Swans players. Several who had struggled under Eade blossomed under his leadership. Surprisingly, the Swans won most of their remaining games that year (six of their last ten), and the fans soon let it be known who they wanted as coach by reviving the famous "ROOOOS" call. Despite this, the club administration continued their talks with Wallace (and perhaps others). Finally however, they were unable to ignore the players’ own support for Roos, when, after a win late in the season, all the players surrounded Roos on the field and, unprecedentedly, themselves joined in the "ROOOOS" call. The administrators knew when they were beaten, and appointed Roos coach for the 2003 season (despite reportedly having to pay Wallace a considerable amount to unwind their almost-concluded deal with him).
Under Roos’ coaching, Sydney participated in every finals series between 2003 and 2008. They made it to the preliminary final stage in 2003, the semi-final stage in 2004, won the Premiership in 2005 and almost retained it in 2006, losing the Grand Final by only one point, and then got eliminated in the first week of the 2007 finals. They made it to the second week of the 2008 finals. But 2009 was the second time under Roos’ leadership that they didn’t make the finals.
Roos also implemented a policy of giving up first round draft picks in exchange for players from other clubs: namely, Darren Jolly, Ted Richards, Peter Everitt, Martin Mattner, Rhyce Shaw and Shane Mumford in the years 2004–2009 inclusive. Only Jolly and Everitt are no longer at the club, and the other players earned more game-time than they did at their original clubs; this policy paying off for Paul Roos.