How Goodwins tough talk made May elite

A fellow Demon defender has explained how hard conversations between once-unfit full-back Steven May and senior coach Simon Goodwin have produced a critical turnaround in the career of the 2021 All-Australian defender.

Michael Hibberd, a fellow defender and friend of May’s, said that some of the tough discussions between Goodwin and May - the defender having had issues with his fitness when he arrived at Melbourne after the 2018 season - had “turned around” May’s career.

Steven May.Credit:Getty Images

Hibberd, who came back into the team for the preliminary final, said Goodwin loved May as a player “and sometimes you’ve got to be hard on the ones you love”.

Another teammate, Tom McDonald, observed that the Demons had succeeded by having “embraced” May’s strengths, rather than trying to turn him into a player that he was not.

Hibberd called May “an incredible leader and an incredible player” but who had been somewhat unfit when he came to Melbourne from Gold Coast.

Within the Demons, it was well known that May had not been as professional with his habits as the club expected for a highly paid player who had been a club captain at Gold Coast, leading Goodwin to have candid talks with May.

“I’m very close with Steve, he’s one of my best mates,” Hibberd told The Age.

“To see early on, he’ll openly admit he was probably just a touch out of shape when he got to the club and I think Goody realised. What we’re seeing now is what we could have been getting earlier. And he had some injury setbacks.

“But he’s just so important to our team. Sometimes you’ve got to be hard on the ones that you love, I guess, and Goody obviously loves him as a player and loves him as a leader.

“He’s an incredible leader for this club and an incredible player. And some of those tough conversations have turned around Steve and his career. But I mean this was always going to happen, when he was in the team the first few years he was so pivotal to us.”

May’s issues were in 2019, his injury-interrupted and below-par first season with the Demons, but he transformed his habits in 2020 when he was in contention for an All-Australian jumper. On Saturday, he shapes a key player, likely to match up on gun Bulldog forward Aaron Naughton, and is certain to play after suffering what the Demons said was a back-related hamstring issue in the preliminary final.

Hibberd said May was one of the most competitive players he had seen.

“He’s just ridiculously talented and ridiculously competitive - I think that’s what sets him apart ... one of the most competitive people I’ve ever met,” Hibberd said.

“His last two seasons have been as good as anyone.”

McDonald said the Demons had embraced May, who was never going to be a fit player relative to others.

“Stevie - he’s never going to look like Adonis, he’s never going to have the lowest body fat and he’s one of the least-fit blokes.

“But what he is probably the strongest competitor, one of the most powerful athletes you could play on and just his will to win is extraordinary.

“I think what we did is we realised that we’ve got to embrace what he’s good at and allow him to play to his strengths, and we did that with Jake (Lever) as well, and that’s how we get the best out of them, rather than trying to change them into something they’re not.”

Jake Niall is a Walkley award-winning sports journalist and chief AFL writer for The Age.Connect via Twitter or email.

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