Melbourne’s Mark Neeld says he was pursued like a criminal before his coaching tenure was continued by his AFL club’s board.
Neeld says running the media gauntlet on Monday before a club board meeting was a strange experience.
“I understand that everybody has a job to do in the industry,” he told Melbourne’s website on Tuesday.
“But I must admit yesterday there was an occasion where I thought I did commit quite a serious crime, when I stopped at a red light and the car was surrounded by about 15 or 20 people.
“I didn’t quite know what to make of that. Apparently, it is what it is and people do what they do.”
Neeld said he and his team of assistants were grilled by the board about the Demons’ grim one-win season.
“It was a scheduled board meeting,” he said.
“Neil Craig, Todd Viney, Josh Mahoney and I went over and presented snapshots, as we do all the time.
“We had a lot of questions about our player list and the development, and how they’re progressing and how we are going to progress them further.
“We sat around and presented a bit of information on that and there were a couple of other things.
“We were going through a number of our players, especially the ones who are somewhere between that 20-plus game mark.
“There was a bit of concentration on those and then the younger ones, because the majority of our list is there.”
Geelong assistant Matthew Knights has been linked with the Demons, with Cats coach Chris Scott raising the topic with his assistant.
“We have had a really brief conversation about it and he hasn’t spoken to anyone at Melbourne,” Scott told reporters in Geelong on Tuesday.
Scott had no doubt Knights, who coached Essendon in 2008-10, could again be a head coach, but said the speculation surrounding Neeld was disrespectful.
“I shouldn’t be commenting on that situation – to be fair to Matthew Knights and to be fair to Mark Neeld as well,” he said.
“I understand you guys in the media need to ask those questions.
“But I think it’s really disrespectful for people within the AFL industry, particularly coaches, to be talking about potential replacements for really capable people who are in a job and contracted.”
