Cameron Schwab’s resignation as Melbourne chief executive came on the same day the embattled AFL team left the city for a mini-camp.
The overnight stay at coastal Sorrento was called in the wake of Saturday night’s appalling 148-point loss to Essendon.
Melbourne finished 16th last year in Mark Neeld’s first season as coach and this season has opened with demoralising losses to Port Adelaide and the Bombers.
“They’re all taking a bit of time out tonight to make sure they are … confronting that as a group,” Schwab said on Tuesday at his resignation media conference.
“They will deal with it, this club will bounce back, don’t worry about that.
“This is a much better and a much stronger club than it is representing itself as at this time.”
Neeld, other senior Melbourne football department staff and the players attended the camp.
Earlier on Tuesday, the Demons’ performance director Neil Craig said the team had to become better at dealing with adversity.
“As stupid as it sounds, this is a great opportunity for the development of our football club and our football department,” Craig said in a video posted on the club website.
“So we need to embrace it and push on … there will be no backing off in this area.”
Craig pointed to their AAMI Park co-tenants the Melbourne Storm, who lost five games in a row last year on the way to winning the NRL premiership.
“That says to me they have great adversity skills, that enable them to stay on track, keep focussed about where they’re going, to rebound from that period of losses and to go on and be very successful.
“They are the skills we need to develop, both from the playing point of view and our football staff and coaches point of view.
“It’s really important to have great adversity skills, to be adversity-tested, if you want to be successful.
“You cannot be successful if you can’t handle adversity.”
Craig added the team had to build a better culture.
“We continue to push down the hard road,” he said.