New Carlton senior coach Josh Fraser "nailed his presentation", according to Blues coaching consultant Adam Simpson.
Fraser was unveiled as the club's 36th senior coach on Tuesday, beating out strong candidates Corey Enright, Jayme Graham, James Kelly and Daniel Giansiracusa.
Simpson, along with Carlton chief executive Graham Wright, president Rob Priestly and football boss Chris Davies, were tasked with selecting the club's next head honcho, with the former Eagles coach providing insight into the winning candidate's presentation.
"I've had the pleasure of working with him since he took over as the interim coach," Simpson said on AFL360.
"He's gone from the interim coach, filling the seat, but when it's 13 weeks, it's a long time. And when you start winning, you start to develop different philosophies, and I think the way he's handled himself publicly is one thing; from no guidance, that's self-inflicted. Whatever he's done in the past to deliver the messaging, that's just him.
"But the growth from a coaching point of view, and how he's developed a team. When he arrived at the club pre-season, his brief was to coach the forwards and help with the ball movement, and I think we're probably seeing that more than anything. The ball movement has picked up.
"But the transition behind it - how you defend behind your ball movement, how you connect with your players, your storytelling - and then you get to the presentation when you finally become available to present, and what he delivered in the presentation was first class."
Fraser has always declared his ambition to become an AFL senior coach, but throughout his caretaker tenure, he continued to maintain that he wasn't ready until he officially put himself into the coaching process.
Simpson believes he may have played the game, but was ready earlier than he said.
"I get the feeling he was ready a lot earlier before he announced he was ready. I think he might have been directed to keep this going. I know for a fact the process: there was no favouritism, there was no coercing on what to present. It was the same brief to all the others. There was integrity there," the 2018 premiership coach said.
"He presented for the same amount of time that everyone else did, and in due course, we might show what the brief was. We parked the wins and losses, and it was more about how do you develop, what's your leadership program, what's your performance mindset, what does your development look like, strategic planning, the bigger picture stuff, that he hasn't had to address up until that presentation."
Fraser took the club from a 1-8 record to a surprise Wildcard Round appearance, claiming 10 wins in 13 outings, with a draw against the Western Bulldogs last week solidifying the Blues' position inside the top 10.
From the outset, the presentation was obvious, but Simpson noted some things he learned about Fraser that he otherwise didn't know.
"I saw some numbers on what had happened in the competition and where they sit in the time he's taken over as coach," he added.
"But that was the 30-second piece that connected to the winning. Not this is what I've done. It was this is what I've done the last 15 years, not the last 15 weeks, so that was on its merits; it was a pretty clean process.
"I was actually quite relieved (that he impressed). And I can't speak for the others, but I was relieved he nailed the presentation because there were some really good presentations before him.
"It married up with the performance."
