Feeling the pressure, down the coaching line, in struggling teams Garry Lyon
The Age
June 7, 2014 It's a fact of life that, around the halfway point of any AFL season, there will be senior coaches who are under the blowtorch.
When expectations don't meet performance, all eyes generally turn to the man in charge. Right now, it's Damien Hardwick who is feeling the heat. Having broken through last season and taken the Tigers into September for the first time since 2001, the talk over the pre season was not whether they could repeat that performance, but rather, whether they would be able to improve enough to secure a spot in the top four.
Three wins and seven losses into the season and, understandably, questions are being asked from a disappointed supporter base and an unsympathetic media pack.
Over here on the east coast, we're not exactly sure of the pressure that may, or may not be mounting on new West Coast Eagles coach Adam Simpson, but we do know that the Eagles are a wealthy and powerful organisation that expects a positive return on their substantial investment.
With only wins over lowly Western Bulldogs, Melbourne, St Kilda and GWS, and three losses at Patersons Stadium in the first 10 weeks of the year, the expected improvement is slow in materialising.
The likes of Hardwick, Simpson, Brendan McCartney, Alan Richardson and Justin Leppitsch would never run away from their responsibilities. The very qualities that have seen them appointed senior AFL coaches would also ensure that they were very clear in making sure that it is understood that the buck stops with them.
They are the men charged with the ultimate responsibility to bring success and improvement to their football clubs. They are paid accordingly, are lauded when their side wins and they cop it on the chin when their side is performing poorly.
That is the way we, the football public, have been conditioned to think and react. And as much as Trent Cotchin and Matthew Priddis can come out in the press earlier this week, and, admirably, ask that the supporters don't blame the coach but rather direct their frustrations at the playing group, we all know that, when it is all said and done, one man alone is ultimately going to be held accountable.
Well, maybe it is time to think beyond just the senior coach when we are looking for answers for our poorly performing football side. And maybe it is time we became more familiar with the increasingly large assistant coaching fraternity that share every important kind of responsibility for a team's performance throughout the week, yet are never or rarely held to account on at the weekend.
While all clubs are different in the way they assemble their support coaching staff, and all senior coaches are different in the way they delegate and apportion responsibility, there is no doubt that the assistants are playing a bigger role in the preparation and coaching of the football team than ever before.
We are seeing signs, particularly among the more senior and experienced coaches, of a morphing of the senior coach into, much like the European soccer clubs, more of a football manager.
Some senior coaches are spending less time on the training track through the week, and more time in overseeing the entire operation. It is not an exaggeration to suggest that a specific line coach would have far more contact hours, and therefore influence, on the performance of his specific group of players than the senior coach would ever have.
The senior coach has to try to divide his time among 42 players, and among that group 26-28 would be his priority. The line coach would talk to his group of players continually, he sits down with them to review their tapes after a game, he is on the training track constantly, monitoring and providing intimate feedback on every single aspect of their game.
So, it stands to reason, that these assistant and line coaches are absolutely critical to the performance of a side when it plays. Yet, unless you were a hard core supporter of your own team, they largely go unnoticed and are never subjected to the sort of scrutiny and criticism that we reserve for the main man in charge.
If I was a West Coast supporter, I would want to hear from Justin Longmuir, the man responsible for the forward line group at the Eagles. I know there is so much more to take into consideration, but I would be interested to hear from him how the Eagles could go inside 50 at the weekend 52 times, yet score just six goals.
I would like to know how they can boast a forward line of Josh Kennedy, Jack Darling, Nic Naitanui, Dean Cox and Mark LeCras, yet be ranked 14th in the competition for marks inside 50.
And how is it that the Eagles have scored less than 45 points at Subiaco just three times, ever. And they all happened to have taken place in the past eight matches there.
I know it is not his sole responsibility, for ball movement, and 'plus ones' and seven-man backlines, delivery inside 50 and a host of other things need to be taken into consideration, but the fact remains, his forward line group is not producing and it is fair to ask the question of him, and not just level everything at Simpson.
It would be good to hear from Brendon Lade, the forward line coach at Richmond, about the instructions he was giving Ben Griffiths on Saturday night, and the things they discussed in the breaks about Griffiths' inability or unwillingness to even get to a marking contest, let alone actually take one.
Leigh Tudor has a well-won reputation as one of the best assistant coaches in the competition, having enjoyed great success at Geelong, St Kilda and Sydney. He is now the midfield coach at North Melbourne. At various stages this year I have seen Jobe Watson, Steele Sidebottom and Mitch Duncan run around against the Kangaroos with seemingly no one on them as they amassed an enormous amount of football and had a huge influence on their respective team's victory over North. I would love to hear from him how that was allowed to happen.
Similarly, a side's success should not all, necessarily, be placed at the feet of the senior coach. Ken Hinkley has had an enormous impact at Port, but we've also heard constantly about Darren Burgess and his influence. And I bet if you asked Ken, he would deflect some of the praise to the likes of Phil Walsh, Josh Carr, Tyson Edwards and Matthew Nicks as well.
Just as Paul Roos would concede that Jack Watts' improvement as a footballer is due in part to the work of ultra experienced assistant George Stone.
It's way too simplistic to go looking for the scalp of the senior coach when things are going south at your club. We need to share the burden of responsibility. Senior coaches will be very quick to push their assistants forward when things are going well, and will speak glowingly of them when they are in the frame for a senior job themselves. But they will never point the finger when things are falling apart.
It's just the way it is, 'passing the buck' is not a part of their psyche. But that is not to say we shouldn't. And by putting the assistants on notice, and making them answerable, publicly, it would be doing them a favour.
For if they aspire to one day assume the main role, scrutiny, responsibility, accountability and criticism will hit them fast and it will hit them hard.
http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/feeling-the-pressure-down-the-coaching-line-in-struggling-teams-20140606-zrzjp.html
