THERE'S a waiting room stocked with magazines and functional, slightly shabby furniture.

There's a young woman who emerges and says, "You can come in now."

Inside there is a sense of uneasy calm, and psyches to be probed. And, yes, there's a couch.

Welcome to day one of the AFL finals countdown, a group therapy session for four coaches and four captains at the Fox Sports studios in Melbourne's Southbank.

The couch, of course, is the couch on which Mike Sheahan and Paul Roos sit during the season, but on this day it's overflow seating for members of the media.

It's a little the worse for wear and frayed around the edges - and, frankly, so are some of the coaches.

There's an interesting dynamic at play. The media pack clearly expects Mick Malthouse to respond quite differently to its questions than, say, Chris Scott.

Similarly, there is a little more tension in the air when Alastair Clarkson is on stage than when James Hird is there.

Essendon is first up. Captain Jobe Watson is finishing up a radio interview on his mobile phone, so everyone waits until he's done.

Hird just seems happy to be in the finals, while Watson, ever self-deprecating, talks about the rev-up speech he gave the Bombers before their last finals appearance, which ended in a 96-point thrashing at the hands of the Crows.

He'd urged them to play that match like it was their last, Watson says. For some it probably was, so he admits he won't be trying that line this time around.

Then comes Hawthorn. Clarkson is a little bit tetchy and unwilling to give anything away. Skipper Luke Hodge trots out the line about Friday night's clash with Geelong being just another game. Move along here, folks; nothing to see.

Collingwood is next, and when Malthouse answers an early question with a clipped 'No' and a withering stare at the inquisitor there's a sense of impending doom.

A query about Darren Jolly and a possible knee injury is dismissed with a so-you-think-you-know-more-than-me from the Magpies coach. Things are not going well.

Then comes a question about the possible weather on Saturday afternoon and suddenly Malthouse's mood is as sunny as the glorious spring day outside, to the apparent relief of the reporters.

He points out that his forecasting abilities are notoriously poor, and captain Nick Maxwell chuckles, clearly in on a private gag.

The coach says his research into the weather this week will extend to sticking his hand out the window and seeing if it gets wet, before suggesting that in his next life he would be a television weather presenter.

So that's the Collingwood succession sorted. No director of football role for Mick Malthouse under Nathan Buckley next year. He'll be working for The Weather Channel.

Finally Scott and Cameron Ling file in. Scott is restrained and polite, while Ling nods incessantly as his coach speaks like one of those minor politicians lined up behind the likes of Julia Gillard or Tony Abbott at media conferences.

Scott, facing his first finals series as an AFL coach, points to the anticipation everyone is feeling. "This is where reputations are made," he says. "With that comes a bit of a nervous excitement. The real stuff starts from here."

After the questions are exhausted and one reporter's voice recorder noisily runs out of tape, it's time to pack up.

Ling leaves carrying the Cats' advertising backdrop under his arm, noting to the club's media man, "Good straight bats there."

He's right. For a session on the couch, not a lot has been given away.

The views in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of the AFL or its clubs