Former Geelong star forward Cameron Mooney believes Richmond has made an excellent choice with its appointment late last year of Gerard Murphy as a leadership consultant.

Mooney, a dual Geelong premiership player, and now a football commentator, heaped huge praise on Murphy in a ‘Sportsday’ interview with Tiger small defender Steven Morris, who was recently elevated into the Club’s playing leadership group.

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“Steve, there was a great man down in Geelong years ago – Gerard Murphy – who headed up Leading Teams.  He came down to Geelong in 2007 and, in my opinion, turned the whole club around,” Mooney said.

“He turned the (playing) group around, and we went on and had some amazing success.

“He’s not in the Leading Teams department now, but he’s down there (at Richmond) doing his own thing with you blokes . . .”

Morris then outlined the impact Murphy already was having at Tigerland.

“He’s been fantastic for us, Gerard.  Just helping with our leadership team, with our development, how we can communicate better with one another.  With his experience, he’s just invaluable to us as a young, developing group,” Morris said.

“I’ve found him really helpful personally, just with some things in my game, and I know that a lot of the players, young and old, will benefit from his experience, and working with a great team such as Geelong . . .

“As a young team all we want is success.  What we need is to focus on performance, and that’s what we’re doing.”

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Morris acknowledged the sometimes challenging nature of Murphy’s leadership program.

“When we do sit up there in front of 40 blokes, sure it is difficult, and it’s pretty confronting.  You hear some things that you don’t want to exactly hear, but the underlining thing is we’re worried about performance and that’s the real thing that he drums home to us,” Morris said.

“If you’re not here and you’re not focused on performance as your No. 1 thing, then you’re not here for the right reasons.

“That’s why I think he was so successful at Geelong, and he’s going to be so valuable for us at Richmond.”