Untried coaches deserve their chance despite struggles of previous interim coaches

Matthew Primus’s poor record after graduating from interim to senior coach at Port Adelaide has made other clubs wary of going down the same path. But Carlton’s David Teague and North Melbourne’s Rhyce Shaw deserve their chance.

Matthew Primus stands — quite unfairly — as the marker where AFL clubs went off anointing interim coaches.

Since Primus took charge of a sinking ship at Port Adelaide, no caretaker coach — and there are 11 in this category so far — has kept the keys to the big office at any AFL club.

By contrast, of the eight interim coaches appointed from 2001 to Primus’ rise as Mark Williams successor in 2010, four (half) stayed in charge of their teams. One, Paul Roos, became the Swans’ longest-serving coach — after Sydney was poised to appoint the experienced Terry Wallace — at 202 games. Roos also ended the South Melbourne-Sydney 72-year premiership drought.

This damning trend might change now that Swans premiership coach John Longmire has opted to stay at Sydney with a contract extension to 2023 rather than return to Arden Street to accept North Melbourne’s “Godfather” offer to coach the Kangaroos for the next five years with a $7.5 million salary. The ambitious Rhyce Shaw has hope again — and growing support.

David Teague’s prospects at Carlton might have appeared shot last week by football director Chris Judd’s declaration the Blues need an experienced mentor rather than a coach working with “training wheels”.

Matthew Primus as caretaker coach at Port.

Teague’s record since replacing Brendon Bolton reads superbly. As well as Primus’ results at the end of the 2010 season when Port Adelaide opted for its own as senior coach at Alberton. The Power overlooked the untried Chris Scott, who in 2011 made the perfect start to his AFL senior coach career by guiding Geelong to the premiership.

Primus closed the 2010 season with a 5-2 win-loss record, including a remarkable win in Showdown 29 — his second match — to break the Power’s nine-game losing streak.

Primus’ final record at Alberton — 13-34 with just three wins in 2011 and five in 2012 before closing with a disastrous loss to expansion club Greater Western Sydney in Sydney — is tainted by the financial crisis at Port Adelaide that overwhelmed the Power’s repeatedly underfunded football department. Certainly the fitness program at Alberton was not up to AFL standard, as was obvious with the repetitive last-quarter collapses while opposition teams mocked the Power players for being out on their feet at the last change.

Primus’ coaching reputation was unfairly stained by Port Adelaide becoming the political damage of the AFL-SANFL power plays to control SA football.

The fallout to every interim coach since Primus’ appointment was highlighted in 2015 when Crows football director Mark Ricciuto dismissed Adelaide’s caretaker coach Scott Camporeale’s prospects of keeping the job at West Lakes (despite a 7-3 win-loss count that included a Showdown) … because of the Primus theme.

“So … Matty Primus did win five out of his seven games as a caretaker coach (after he replaced Mark Williams). He went pretty well ..,” Ricciuto said on radio.

On television last week Judd, as a panellist on Footy Classified on Channel 9, revived the memories of Ricciuto’s concern with being lulled into a false sense of certainty with caretaker coaches.

Judd said: “We want an experienced coach that can takes us to the next step, we don’t want someone with training wheels on.

“He’s (Teague) getting some really good experience now … in effect he coaches his own team, but it’s not really the same as being an actual senior coach of a football team with the pressure that comes with that.”

Teague delivered a superb response — on and off the field — at the SCG on Saturday when he guided Carlton to its third win in his five games as caretaker coach. Before beating the Swans, Teague mocked Judd’s remarks by saying: “I was thinking about walking into the change rooms for my next team meeting with training wheels attached, but I couldn’t find my son’s training wheels.”

Teague, who was highly regarded as a future AFL coaching prospect by the late Phil Walsh, and Shaw should not extend the lost of caretaker coaches asked to hand back the keys by any continuation of the so-called Primus lesson at Port Adelaide.

The real lesson at Alberton in 2010-12 was the danger of not fully financing a football program.

MARKING TIME AS CARETAKER COACHES

BEFORE PRIMUS

(2001-2010)

BEN ALLAN (Fremantle) in 2001. Succeeded by Chris Connolly.

GRANT THOMAS (St Kilda) in 2001. Senior coach for 123 games, second longest-serving coach for Saints.

PAUL ROSS (Sydney) in 2002. Senior coach for 202 games. longest-serving coach for Swans.

MARK RILEY (Melbourne) in 2007. Succeeded by Dean Bailey.

MARK HARVEY (Fremantle) in 2007. Senior coach for 97 games.

BRETT RATTEN (Carlton) in 2007. Senior coach for 120 games.

JADE RAWLINGS (Richmond) in 2009. Succeeded by Damien Hardwick.

DARREN CROCKER (N Melbourne) in 2009. Succeeded by Brad Scott.

AFTER PRIMUS

(2010-today)

MARK BICKLEY (Adelaide) in 2011. Succeeded by Brenton Sanderson.

TODD VINEY (Melbourne) in 2011. Succeeded by Mark Neeld.

PAUL WILLIAMS (Sydney) in 2011. Succeeded by John Longmire.

GARRY HOCKING (Port Adelaide) in 2012. Succeeded by Ken Hinkley.

NEIL CRAIG (Melbourne) in 2013. Succeeded by Paul Roos.

JOHN BARKER (Carlton) in 2015. Succeeded by Brendon Bolton.

SCOTT CAMPOREALE (Adelaide) in 2015. Succeeded by Don Pyke.

MATTHEW EGAN (Essenndon) in 2015. Succeeded by John Worsfold.

DEAN SOLOMON (Gold Coast) in 2017. Succeeded by Stuart Dew.

RHYCE SHAW (N Melbourne) this year.

DAVID TEAGUE (Carlton) this year.

Originally published as Untried coaches deserve their chance despite struggles of previous interim coaches