Strategy Our Next Senior Coach: 2019 & Beyond... is Matthew Nicks

[Rave Slave]

I rate Bassett but would be shocked if he’d be interested or even considered given he always danced to the beat of his own drum.

As far as recruiting ex players he’s one I’d be happy to see come back simply because he’s not drunk any of the Kool Aid.

 

[Betts are off]

The nub of the issue is actually attracting someone of substance.

It’s not like we can say - here’s the keys, do what you need to do, take total control.

No siree - you come here and 1st things first...meet Campo, he WILL be your right hand man.

Meet Bird the footy manager - he’s an old boy and best mates with a board member - you’ll learn to like him.

And there’s nothing wrong with our list either, we’ve assembled them and nothing is their fault.

I could go on, but you get the idea.

What strong, independent qualified Coach will be happy to walk into that

I just keep thinking of 1 name...Malcolm Flippin Blight!

Im pretty sure he is the only man who has enough backbone to rip the weeds out from the root in that clusterf__k. Who know's if he can still coach at all, but at least it will be entertaining watching him clean house!

 

[Interloperer]

Blight's last coaching job was so long ago it was closer to his playing days than now.

 

[Bicks]

Blight's last coaching job was so long ago it was closer to his playing days than now.

And didn't that go well at the Saints.

 

[SaltPeter]

And didn't that go well at the Saints.

Went in hard, upset admin and players from the start. Demanded change. Got sacked.

Probably did himself a favour and saved himself a couple years of frustration playing the game and treading water

 

[Betts are off]

Blight's last coaching job was so long ago it was closer to his playing days than now.

2 things;

1; It was a joke, kinda, (I would still love to see what he would do if put in that situation... The shot calling, not so much the coaching!)

2; There is a 'reply' button on the bottom right hand of each post! Not just aimed at you, just seen people replying to posts as a new comment a few times lately and its one of those things that shouldn't bug me, but it does.

 

[Bicks]

Went in hard, upset admin and players from the start. Demanded change. Got sacked.

Probably did himself a favour and saved himself a couple years of frustration playing the game and treading water

It's 2019 in the new millennium, what might have worked then is unlikely to work now. John Reid had a hell of a lot to do what happened back then too, they're both old men now.

 

[Wood_Duck]

Justin Leppitsch, he coached Richmond to a flag in 2017.

 

[SaltPeter]

It's 2019 in the new millennium, what might have worked then is unlikely to work now. John Reid had a hell of a lot to do what happened back then too, they're both old men now.

The beauty of the external review, if taken seriously and not just for lip service. Gives a business/club the opportunity to make wholesale change while distancing themselves from being massive arseholes.

 

[mattymac]

Won't matter who it is unless Campo, Hart, Birdman and Clarke go too.

Exactly. I would much prefer replacing them first and surrounding Pyke with some competent operators from non-AFC backgrounds

 

[hippyhippy]

why would any coach want to come here with all the same people running the show? career suicide.

those people need to go first... i would keep pyke and get actual professionals around him.

 

[jackster83]

Exactly. I would much prefer replacing them first and surrounding Pyke with some competent operators from non-AFC backgrounds

Last year was our opportunity to do that.

It didn't happen.

We swept the club's incompetence under the carpet and refused to spend the money on our coaching panel.

Opportunity wasted. The end result is Pyke won't be getting another contract.

 

[mattymac]

This is all utterly pointless talk (not least because Goodwin will be our next coach) until we do something about the assistants.

We need to look at getting the best assistants around our coach.

Failed head coaches seem a good place to look. Some have gone on to be excellent assistants: Ratten, Sanderson, Leppitsch.

 

[FAITH]

Goodwin won't leave MFC

 

[mattymac]

Last year was our opportunity to do that.

It didn't happen.

We swept the club's incompetence under the carpet and refused to spend the money on our coaching panel.

Opportunity wasted. The end result is Pyke won't be getting another contract.

If only we had a chairman capable of leadership.

 

[hey shorty]

I rate Bassett but would be shocked if he’d be interested or even considered given he always danced to the beat of his own drum.

As far as recruiting ex players he’s one I’d be happy to see come back simply because he’s not drunk any of the Kool Aid.

Hes had a different kind of Kool Aid

 

[mattymac]

Goodwin won't leave MFC

Ok

 

[Golumless]

Well it's either dump Pyke, or clean out the assistant coaches.

I'd be cleaning out those assistant coaches personally, though with Pyke playing Mackay in the midfield for a large portion of the North game despite us needing to give Milera midfield time (and him being a spark plug we are seriously lacking there as we are just way too slow) means I am very close to wanting him sacked.

 

[Mismatched]

The nub of the issue is actually attracting someone of substance.

It’s not like we can say - here’s the keys, do what you need to do, take total control.

No siree - you come here and 1st things first...meet Campo, he WILL be your right hand man.

Meet Bird the footy manager - he’s an old boy and best mates with a board member - you’ll learn to like him.

And there’s nothing wrong with our list either, we’ve assembled them and nothing is their fault.

I could go on, but you get the idea.

What strong, independent qualified Coach will be happy to walk into that

Nailed it there, unfortunately even if we convince the ideal coach to come, he’s unlikely to succeed as he’ll have what is esssentially Neil Craig’s football department thrust upon him.

If Don Pyke can’t turn us around and succeed with the current set up, then we need the motherload of all cleanouts from the top down. shuffling a deck chair or 2 will do nothing. I suspect there is a massive cultural issue which cannot properly be sorted unless there’s a significant change in personel.

 

[Mismatched]

Well it's either dump Pyke, or clean out the assistant coaches.

I'd be cleaning out those assistant coaches personally, though with Pyke playing Mackay in the midfield for a large portion of the North game despite us needing to give Milera midfield time (and him being a spark plug we are seriously lacking there as we are just way too slow) means I am very close to wanting him sacked.

Or we can do both.

 

[Golumless]

Or we can do both.

We could, though I'd be wondering if that's too much instability for a side, in which considering how much we've locked up in our brigade (some of it stupidly), I'd be quite hesitant about. We're in quite a precarious position right now salary cap wise.

The assistants definitely needs a broom. Does the head coach though? well that i'm not sure about. Pyke has shown to be ok tactically, though starting to become a bit too Hinkley like for my liking (though there is a long time in the season to reverse it). Equally, do we keep trying to win a premiership with this core in 2020 or is it time to give the next generation the keys? Having Pyke as a caretaker for a year or two when we're restructuring wouldn't be the worst, so far shown he has a good touch with development.

 

[FAITH]

I have heard Roo say recently that he would welcome Craigy back anytime, he's an absolute gun, except form a tactical perspective in the coaches box.

 

[BRL121]

There won't be the scale of changes desired by BF unless preceded by a warts-and-all root-and-branch full club review, a la Richmond. That's the best way to handle things.

 

[ManInTheArena]

Clarke is the coach that came up with the idea that Sauce should run in and jump early on purpose to put the other ruck off his game. Jacobs mentioned this was a deliberate strategy from the coaches and I don't think it has ever worked effectively. He also taps extremely defensively and hasn't been coached to be offensive - either through tapping far outside the stoppage or grabbing and kicking the ball - although O'Brien does the latter on occasion.

It's also a problem that any coach, regardless of quality, has been an assistant for the 10 (?) years that Clarke has. A turnover of ideas is good with a fast evolving game.

So Clarke tried something new, and you think Jacobs taps too defensively? It's not really "sack the coach" material. We've never had a bad or even below average ruck division, so I'm not sure why Clarke gets hammered. There are so many other personnel problems that need fixing before we even look at Clarke.

And tenure should be based on performance, not time.

 

[Scorpus]

So Clarke tried something new, and you think Jacobs taps too defensively? It's not really "sack the coach" material. We've never had a bad or even below average ruck division, so I'm not sure why Clarke gets hammered. There are so many other personnel problems that need fixing before we even look at Clarke.

And tenure should be based on performance, not time.

Well it's more than just that. How many ruckman have we developed aside from Jacobs under his watch? Has any other ruck come in and improved their game to become AFL standard in that time? Just think how many we've had, and how many have been utter shit. Even Jenkins has not improved one iota since he arrived in the ruck. He is just as awful as he was when he debuted.

And Jacobs came to us effectively ready made from his stint at Carlton.

You might easily brush aside the weird and ineffective tactics we've employed in the ruck over the years but I see that as part of the problem. We continue to use these tactics to this day despite them not working.

On top of this, if he has any involvement at all with our midfield structures at stoppages and how our midfield reads the ruck he should be sacked immediately. We are garbage in that department.