Tomorrow, the Greater Western Sydney GIANTS will play in the first ever Sydney Derby at ANZ Stadium.

Years of hard work and a massive financial investment from communities, governments and the AFL will come to life when the 18^th club takes to the field for the first time.

Sitting in the coaches box, watching this unfold will be the club’s first ever employee, Alan McConnell. McConnell’s story is an incredible one. He has been involved in the last club to merge in the AFL and the newest club to enter it.

Not many people can look back on their career and say that they were part of the beginning and the part of the end but McConnell looks back at his days as coach of the Fitzroy Lions fondly.

“It wasn’t my job to get involved in all the hype around the merge, my job was to coach. It’s a business so I did my best to divorce myself from the emotion of all of that.

“My job was to manage and look after a playing list that was very young, very inexperienced and terribly fractured as a result of the circumstances they found themselves in.

“It was a unique experience.

“I probably felt that I was never going to be as emotionally attached to an organization as I was to Fitzroy because of what happened there. Maybe now that’s no longer true.”

Since then, McConnell has worked at the Geelong Football Club and the AIS. The man who now sits at the head of the GIANTS, CEO David Matthews, entrusted McConnell with leading the AFL’s push in to Western Sydney.

“There was a period of time where, because I was the only employee I actually used to walk in to a room and be introduced as the Greater Western Sydney Football Club.

“I’d been in Sydney for two years prior to that in my role as AIS Head Coach so I had a bit of an understanding of this marketplace.

“My role initially was to coach and manage an U 18 team in the TAC Cup. Part of that was to foster local talent that would hopefully one day end up on this list.

“In fact two of those players did make the list, Josh Bruce and Jacob Townsend.

“There was a lot of conjecture in the media about whether this would happen but never with the people that I worked with.”

When McConnell speaks about tomorrow’s match, he is measured and selects his words carefully but there is a smile on his face.

“There have been lots of significant moments and the weekend is another significant moment. I guess that is the context that we need to look at this in.

“We’re not here to make up the numbers. I’m not here for this organization to be just the 18^th team in the competition.

“There is a much bigger prize that we are chasing and that is the success of this club in the competition and the ability to put our game in this market place.

“We need to enjoy the moment, celebrate what has been achieved so far but also remember where we’re going.”

By Rebecca Mills

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2012 TOYOTA AFL Premiership Season ROUND 1

GWS GIANTS v Sydney Swans
 

Saturday March 24, 7pm
 

ANZ STADIUM