INTERVIEW: Caroline Wilson - 26 November 2024

Published Nov 26, 2024, 7:06 AM
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Caroline Wilson, thanks to Harvey Norman Clearance Center, cooking appliances, washing machines, dishwashers, TVs and more. Nine to nineteen Marrigan Road Marrier. Yes, not Thursday, but Tuesday Special Edition thanks to Harving Norman Clearance Center. Caroline Wilson. This is a surprise, but so was the announcement.

Well, I was putting together, Hello Tim, Hello Steven. I was putting together or starting to put together my annual list of the ten biggest stories of the year or twelve biggest stories of the year that we are going to do next Thursday week next Thursday for my last show of the year. And little did I know that one of them would bob up a week before, so belong on line. I still don't think it's probably the biggest story of the year. I think there were a couple of others, but anyway, we'll come to that next week. But it wasn't bombshell, but it was, in my view, I don't know about you two. Clearly the right decision for John Longmeyer, not just well, not just because he was starting to think in the middle of the year that he didn't know whether he could get through this year. But I don't know how you come back from if you're thinking that way anyway, I don't know Steven, how you come back from a performance like that in a Grand final.

Well, it's it's it's the last two Grand finals and he's last four. So there's a body of word now. And he is a fierce competitor. He was a terrific footballer. He had a hate losing. And I think it's like he looks over his right hand shoulder and there's Dean Cox. He says, well, listen, he's ready to go. Im as well go myself. I think that's great awareness, Caro.

And I think had other clubs had that awareness and coaches, that those clubs would be a lot better off. I mean, you look back come whether Adelaide never really recovered from that game against Richmond under Don Pike. I think I think Richmond and Damien Harved sort of parted ways at the end of twenty twenty when it emerged that Richmond, I know it just won their third flag in four years, but Damien Hardwick sort of hinted that he was cooked, and it struggled with COVID and struggled with the restrictions of COVID and clearly something that was damaged there. And we know that his personal life was in turmoil. I mean he was seeing someone from the club, his marriage was breaking up. There was a power and balance with the club relationship and I think had that club been Richmond been brave enough, I think that that would have been the time to end their relationship with Damien Harwick. But it's very hard to call it and very few people do it at a time that they should do it, and I think and Lee Matthews did it at the right time. Remember he sent away from Brisbane the year before his contract was out, walked away from another year's salary, but was brave enough to see that his message was no longer impacting on the players. And I thought there was tign on Grand Final day and in Grand Final week Tim and we spoke about this week after. But you know, the AFL said Sydney had been difficult to deal with compared to Brisbane. John became It was really tense and there was not panic, but there was a lot more uneasey than there needed to be, perhaps given from what we could see late in the first quarter things there was a feeling that panic was seeping in and it wasn't. I'm not sure that it was just the fact that the players should have capitulated. I wonder if everybody is a collective failed there. And look, we can't take away from the fact that this is one of the game's longest serving coaches with one of the greatest coaching records, and you know Sydney had won as the Sydneys want called one two flag. He coached one of them and they nearly always made finals. I think that only really this year you could argue that they were the best team. Certainly they finished prop of the ladder. I thought it seemed to it got away from them against the Bulldog, but they were ambush by Hawthorne in twenty fourteen. Hawthorne was way too good for them that year, and I think that they were really not quite they certainly, I don't think for the second best team. When they lost to Geelong two years ago, they were very young side. So this was the one that really was did the damage. And then the new question is it right for him to stay on and keep working at the club in that senior management What is that?

That seemed to me like, if we've got a contract and we don't want to going on gardening leave. We want you to do something.

Well, yeah, I've questioned it to Tim. I mean he is, He's got a lot of strings to his bow. John Longmire he was obviously was a player manager after he quit playing and he went out on a premiership if you remember as the North Melbourne player when he was very much a veteran. He has strong views on list management, on club, all performance, all management. And he you know, he'd already asked and the club had already asked the AFL if he could have time off, including over the draft, and take some money out of the soft cap and help develop Stean Cox as a coach going forward, you know, perhaps twenty twenty six. Now, I think there's He was the one who had the idea about the march, you know, from the new headquarters into the SCG with the players. That works so well this year. How it will work if they're not winning games most weeks, it'll be interesting. But he had his entrepreneurial and I think the club, well, he's got some strong ideas and a strong partnership with iron Je, the club sponsors, so there is money there for him to fulfill that role. But I reckon what it means now, Tim is that and Stephen is a pas Manian job is now a ration three?

Yes, that's two years the fresh so it's long more, it's Alistair Clarkson and it's Fagan.

No, not not for mine. I've got Nathan right up there, and I've got Chris Scott and I've got John Longmeyer prevailing. The prevailing view is that if they come into the competition in twenty twenty eighth, the coach would want to be there for the year before twenty twenty seven. My understanding is that that is not the case. Brendan Gale and his team want the coach at the end of next year.

Oh that early, yep.

And I think if the coach is prepared now, that makes it difficult for someone like Chris Scott who to walk away from Geelong. And I'm not I don't even know if Chris Scott wants the job, but well that's not true. I know that he is. You know, he's obviously not tantalized by the thought of Tasmania, but he would definitely be tempted. And he's had huge success in a set of a small town and that regional type on football club and he's made it his own and he's obviously a brilliant coach. Nathan Buckley would be available at the end of next year because he's not coaching at the moment, is working in the media. He's got contacts, but I'm sure his media organization would Asians would let him out of those contracts. And of course John longmy now is not going to be coaching next year. And I think the view of the Tasmanian board is that they want their they would love their coaches better in the club. It's not by the end of next year, by the start twenty twenty six. Geez okay, let's I mean, well, I think it sort of makes sense and I honestly believe that I know they're going to go for experienced coach and the Nathan Buckley has never coached a premiership but he again is someone who has walked away, needed time off, came so close on two occasions, certainly against West Coast and then the year they lost by less than a kick to GWS in the prelim. But I also and I also think the Nathan Buckley's personal circumstances his former wife is now I think he's engaged to a Tasmanian native and it would suit his family arrangement to work in Tasmania. And I think that he is undernowed about whether he wants to return to coaching, but a couple three or four years away could be just perfect. But the other issue, of course, is and it's interesting because John Longmeyer was the coach who alluded the AFL to issues of mental health with players the year he coached Sit into a Flag in twenty twenty twelve. He met the Commission after that premiership win and explained how at least one third of his team had been severely well, sort of affected and struggling with mental health where it was anxiety, depression, whatever, in the days leading up to that Grand Final, and it really opened the competition's eyes to that. And now you've got John Longmire himself saying that he's cooked and even in the middle of this year that he was thinking it might be his last year and he didn't know that he could get through the year. And this is in a year when the team's doing really well and the competition's also got Chris Fagan, the premiership coach who we now know that in late May thought about walking away from the game completely and quitting coaching because he just didn't feel he felt so under pressure. He was, so he was obviously very stressed by what was going on with the Hawthorne racism situation and what had happened to him when he'd done mediation with some of his first nation families. But to think that, and obviously and he was really struggling to be a pressure having lost a Grand Final by list and a goal. So you've got two of the best coaches in the game not really coaching. Now. This is not a wake up call for the AFL's Football department and the AFL commissioned and Andrew Billen. Then I don't know what is.

What's the answer?

Let's just take a deep breathy. I mean, God, I think the fact they've got an AFL coaches associations the reason they sow seed. Go and asks posta cooglu about pressure. Go and ask a Premier league coach over in Europe about pressure. Go and ask anyone coaches a national team about pressure.

I mean, really, they.

Well, they can manage their own time. They can manage their.

Own time refusing to go into coaching, and they're all taking jobs in the media.

Yeah, I understand that, Caroline. I'm just wondering, what, what is the solution for such a demanding job? What is the solution here? So he's gone to the AFL and he said, you know, this is what's happening. There's a lot of pressure on us, coaches and the like. What's the answer, though, what's the solution. Do they need, you know, four weeks off in the middle of the year where somebody else takes over or is it more of a shared role they disappear for a month. I don't know what what's the answer?

Both of those are very both of those ideas that some people might scoff at, but I don't. John Longby has long been an advocate and he's not the only one. Chriscott is the other one to the fact that coaches still haven't gone back to their pre COVID wages and players at AFL executives tacks now and club executive. So I think that I don't care what anyone says. And I know people say that Longmai became a bit of a winger about this, but he just couldn't believe that, you know, they were the only fraternity I guess who didn't really get the thanks for the AFL for giving up significant, significant amounts of their wage during COVID. I don't really understand why someone likes this Scott or John Longmi, who at the top of their game are taking pay cuts. So and I also think that there should be more time off at the end of the war. I think that when their teams have a buy, they should actually have a buy and just go away. And coaches is their own worst enemy. Some of them find it hard to get away. But I do honestly believe that. I mean, I'm not saying that the press is worse now than it ever was, but I think the states seemed to be higher.

It's only going to get more. I'm just wondering, then, on the back of that, does lonmar coach every end well?

I would like him to have a year off completely and I and even though it's been explained, you know, this new role with the Sydney Swans, I personally thinking he would be a great thing. Now, there'd be other things he could do. Look, you can imagine the money he would command on the speaker's circuit. I don't mind. I don't know Kidney obviously heads. What you're saying, Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly give me want to reward him for what he's done. I can understand that, but I hope it's not too big a role, and I hope it is more of an off field, all of club role because I don't think it's really fair on Dton Cox side that they have you know, John Longmi coming to and I don't think that's going to happen. By the way, another interesting thing, another interesting point about Dan Cox. So it was sort of reported at the time West Coast went really hard after Dan Cox. Now they went hard after him last year at the end of last year when they had decided to stick with Adam Simpson and they were determined to get Dean Cox in more to work with Adam Simpson as a part of a succession plan and a phasing light of the West Coast Premiership coach. Former North Melbourne captain Cox said no, that was when they really would and Cox said no, this time they literally, I'm told Stephen, they made one phone call after Adam Simpson left, after he was some sack or I think it was sack me. It was a mutual agreement. Whatever happened, I'm got to be careful these days, and I Dan Cox basically said no and that was the end of it. They didn't come back to him again. So I think West Coast probably knew then that Dean Cox wasn't you know, didn't have the appetite to come back.

Okay, just getting back to the coaches, I mean, have you heard the word delegate? Have you heard the word control freaks? Let go give give of others time management? I just can't swallow. I understand assistant coaches not getting the wages they do when they do seventy eighty hours. I feel sorry for them. Well, don't do it. You know, if your aspiration is to be a senior coach, well you've got to crawl before you walk. You go to do the time and get your resume up and the where you go. But I haven't got much sympathy for senior coaches. They're all on over a million dollars and they can delegate.

They're they're not all on over a minute.

That Well, if they're not, they're close, I mean, you know it is. They get me wrong.

Why would Why would Chris Fagan have only had his contract extended by a year when Greg Swan the CEO had his contract extended by two years. Why wouldn't and Chris Fagan could have got a five year extended if he wanted. They love him so much, Why hasn't he? Why has Why did kenn Hinckley have that showdown before two contracts ago with David Kosh where he explained about the pressure of coaching in the Adelaide environment. Why did Don Pike give that incredibly emotional press conference when he quit Adelaide and spoke about the pressure of the game on coaches. I mean, too many coaches are staying now, Stephen. I just think in the end, you've got to look at the numbers, and you've got to look at it. I just think that and good coaches, you know, coaches have had great success of saying this. Chris Scott says it gets tougher every year, and he's one of the most successful coaches who's ever coached. I'm not saying I'm not saying their job isn't great. There aren't great highs, great loads, and obviously John Longmira is an emotional man. But I just think it's interesting and look, I also think that probably his relationship with Tom Harley might have been not strained. I mean, obviously they had great success together, but there must have been times that, you know, John was difficult to work with because he could be and the frustrations of the job and the life were obviously get into it.

Hey, Carol, why have we got your Tuesday? I've heard you've got a show for Barbie's. He got a leading show, has he he has?

He's got to send off. And the sendoff was I was going to be on about six weeks ago at Stephen and Barmie. Barmie had a health scare and he had to go to hospital. And I can't tell you like all every club that he worked for, you know, there was nor Would people. There was Geelong people, There was the AFL. Obviously, there was Richmond, there was Collingwood, there was Melbourne, and then the whole thing had to get canceled about three days before and there was He's leaving Richmond after a second and very successful stint and going into semi retirement, although I think he came to do a bit of consulting. Gee, that was the one that got away, wasn't it. When you were almost worried Barney over to Adelaide had nothing to do with me.

It would have been nice if they had got him.

Your core prints were all over it, Ryan Moll.

Don't Carrow speaking.

Anyway anyway, that the send office off the thurisday at the.

Would be a great That would be great, what don't carro Thanks for your toime here, Caroline.

Jim C. Stevens

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