“We need to see accountability and the way he talks about the experience continues to be in the right manner,and he’s obviously got to catch up with a month’s worth of training,so there’s a lot of work to be had in a physical sense and an educational sense.″⁣

Asked whether his teammates would have a say on Thomas’ return,Viney said:“Absolutely.”

“As part of this process,Tarryn spoke to the leadership group about what he’s learnt over the past four weeks and the 12 months leading into this position,” Viney said.

“He was quite vulnerable and open.

“The leadership group put forward what they expect from him moving forward,so it was a good two-way conversation. They’ve certainly got an understanding of where Tarryn’s been at,and Tarryn’s got an understanding of what the leadership group want. Today he’s caught up with the whole playing group about being back.”

Viney said there had been a lot of negative attention on the club during the pre-season,includingcoach Alastair Clarkson making a threatening comment to a Channel Nine journalist, but the Kangaroos were keen to move forward.

“We’re embarking on a really exciting period of time with a new coach and a new footy department,and I think if you spoke to a lot of the people within the organisation,we’re really excited about what we’ve seen so far,” he said.

“But we’re getting a lot of attention for the wrong reasons.

“We speak ongoing around what we expect from our players and the standards and behaviours. I think 99 per cent of what ‘Clarko’ does is first-class;he’s one of the best coaches in modern history. We all have our strengths,and then we have our weaknesses.

“We’ve spoken that he needs to stay cool,calm and collected when the heat’s on. We expect that from our players and from our coaches.”

Following the Roos’ two-point loss to Richmond in their scratch match on Friday,Viney said there was a lot to be positive about on the field.

“Last week in our internal trial we had some concerns. Against Richmond,who we think are still a high-quality team,we saw some really positive stuff,” he said.

“We saw some stuff we’ve been trying to implement,and we lost by two points after four quarters.″⁣

Meanwhile,the club is keen to advance contract talks with key defender Ben McKay,who is out of contract at season’s end.

“We don’t like good players coming out of contract,and he’s a restricted free agent as we all know.

“His management have indicated that they want to see how he goes,let’s get the ball rolling and see how Clarko settles in,but hopefully those conversations start sooner rather than later.”

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