AFL 2021: Hawks legend Alastair Clarkson pulls handbrake on Sam Mitchell, citing timing as crucial
Four-time premiership coach Alastair Clarkson has little doubts his apprentice Sam Mitchell will coach at the top level one day, but has revealed a critical reason why he should not rush.
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Coaching legend Alastair Clarkson counselled heir apparent Sam Mitchell from leaping prematurely into senior coaching after watching a host of mid-30s coaches burnt out too early.
Clarkson said he was sure four-time premiership star Mitchell would become a senior coach as he continues his apprenticeship as the coach of Hawthorn’s VFL affiliate Box Hill.
Clarkson became Hawthorn’s coach at only 36 years of age, but has seen a series of compatriots battle after rushing into senior coaching.
Clarkson said on Sunday it was not his decision whether the Hawks board decided to consider a coaching succession plan.
But he said Mitchell had to time his run before he decided he was ready.
“I’ve got no doubt at some point in time Sam will be an AFL coach. The important thing for both Sam and probably Hawthorn too is that he just doesn’t do that prematurely,” Clarkson told ABC Radio.
“I’ve seen a lot of guys over the last 10 years, decorated servants of the AFL become coaches by the time they’re 34, 35 or 36 years of age.
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“Vossy (Michael Voss), Matty Primus, Brett Ratten, Hirdy (James Hird) and Bucks (Nathan Buckley). It’s a really difficult caper if you go into it prematurely and you want to make sure nothing really fully prepares you for being an AFL coach until you get into those shoes, but getting a strong apprenticeship is important.”
The Hawks have said they have no plans for a succession plan and Clarkson is not sure if he will coach on at the club past 2022.
“That is a decision for the board more so than it is for me, I will have no input on the future of our club in terms of who will be the next coach. The reality is at some point in time I won’t be the coach of the Hawthorn footy club and I am not sure if it’s going to be 18 months’ time or longer than that. The board will make their decision in their wisdom on what is the best decision.”
Clarkson said he was thrilled six of his assistant coaches had been able to have success elsewhere as the likes of Damien Hardwick and Adam Simpson flourished as premiership coaches.
Clarkson is confident new mid-season acquisitions Jackson Callow and Nai Newcombe will play some senior football in the next eight weeks for the injury-ravaged Hawks.
He said handing debuts to younger players would help them gain insight into the speed of the game at AFL level and the work they needed to do to play regularly.
Hawks in turmoil after Suns hiding
By Sam Landsberger
Hawthorn has assembled a “football subcommittee” to plot its path out of the wilderness.
Coach Alastair Clarkson, football boss Rob McCartney, chief executive Justin Reeves and representatives from the board are among those charged with restoring respect for a club which hasn’t won a final since its 2013-15 premiership run.
They should look no further than the first 15 minutes of Saturday night’s 37-point loss to Gold Coast for the blueprint to its rebuild.
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It must’ve felt like training for Izak Rankine (three goals) and Ben King (one goal) at a near-empty SCG as the Suns shot to a 28-0 on the scoreboard and registered 14-0 inside 50s.
Well, in the 2018 “Super Draft” the Suns went Rankine, Jack Lukosius and King inside the first six picks.
Rankine (4.0), Lukosius (14 marks, 27 disposals and a 55m goal) and King (4.1) will fight for the Brownlow Medal votes, along with Touk Miller (37 disposals).
The Hawks entered that draft pick 52, taking Jacob Koschitzke, who, along with Mitchell Lewis, crashed packs with lethargy rather than vigour.
In 2018 the Hawks gave away pick No. 15 and Ryan Burton as part of the trade for Chad Wingard who, like the Hawks, was at his best back in 2013-15.
Nobody expects Koschitzke and Lewis (pick No. 76 in 2016) to be Lance Franklin (No. 5 in 2004) and Jarryd Roughead (No. 2 in 2004), and that goes to the heart of Hawthorn’s fall.
The gulf in talent between the Hawks and Suns is longer than yesterday’s line for COVID-19 tests in Melbourne.
From 2010-2020 the Suns crowned 27 kids in the top 20.
Hawthorn has taken four — Isaac Smith (No. 19 in 2010), Burton (No. 19 in 2015), Will Day (No. 13 in 2019) and Denver Grainger-Barrass (No. 6 in 2020).
Smith is now at Geelong, Burton is at Port Adelaide and Day (ankle) and Grainger-Barrass (knee) are both injured.
The Suns have used 19 top-10 picks, plus taken another 14 prized 17-year-olds outside of the national draft.
Grainger-Barrass was Hawthorn’s first top-10 pick since Mitchell Thorp in 2006.
Here is the upside for Hawthorn.
It is sitting on draft picks No. 2, 21 and 22 this year and so if you count them plus Day and Grainger-Barrass there are five talented teens who should be in the Round 1 team next year.
The Hawks have already changed their list strategy.
At each of the past two drafts they’ve used their first two picks and so the rebuild has started … slowly.
There has been no Rankine, Lukosius and King haul for the Hawks.
But they are expected to take ruckman Ned Moyle (Oakleigh Chargers) or inside midfielder Jai Newcombe (Box Hill) in Wednesday’s mid-season rookie draft and so there could be seven fresh faces in the team of the future, which doesn’t include injured stars James Sicily (knee), Jaeger O’Meara (concussion) and Jack Gunston (back).
The Hawks had been expected to take both Moyle and Newcombe, however Clarkson said only one player would be selected as cover for Jon Patton (retired) unless a shock long-term injury suddenly emerged from the loss to Gold Coast.
Hawthorn’s competitiveness from the first six rounds has dried up.
It is now a team light on for talent and work rate and that is an ugly pairing.
It’s going to be a long road ahead, particularly if they can’t recapture that effort.
But Gold Coast’s glut of elite talent should help light its path out of the darkness.
Suns lose another major cog
Gold Coast is about to be rocked by the loss of another senior assistant coach with Stuart Dew’s right-hand man certain to depart the club.
It can be revealed that Josh Francou, 46, has sold his house in Queensland and is set to move back to Adelaide with his family for personal reasons.
Both Francou’s family and his wife Jo’s family are from Adelaide.
At this stage, the Suns expect that Francou will see out the season before leaving his third AFL club in six seasons.
But his family will head home sooner and there are no guarantees that Francou will remain in Queensland until round 23.
Gold Coast officials have been working through Francou’s departure plans during this week’s AFL bye.
Earlier in the week it was expected that Francou would call it quits immediately, however on Friday there was renewed hope he would stay for the final 11 games.
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Losing another prized assistant would be a major blow for a club which must service the AFL’s largest list, comprising 49 players after Wednesday night’s mid-season rookie draft.
It would also force a significant reshuffle, given Francou’s importance in tutoring the club’s glut of young, talented midfielders.
The likes of Touk Miller, Noah Anderson and Matthew Rowell (when fit) are among those at Francou’s disposal at the AFL’s expansion club.
It was reported that Francou became disillusioned at the Crows in 2018 and left with two years remaining on his contract to join Gold Coast.
The club said in a statement: “Josh Francou has informed the club of his desire to relocate to Adelaide for family reasons at the end of the 2021 season.
“While we’re disappointed to be losing someone of Josh’s experience, the club respects the decision and welcomes his openness in advising us early and allowing us to undertake a well-considered plan to find a suitable replacement for 2022.”
He was one of the few survivors from the Suns’ coaching overhaul last year.
In the past decade the 2002 Brownlow Medal runner-up has coached at Norwood (senior coach), Sydney, Adelaide and the Suns.
The Francou situation means it is the second-straight year where Dew’s box has been impacted mid-season.
It emerged still with a month to play last season that highly-rated assistant Dean Solomon, as well as Nick Malceski and Ashley Prescott, would all be leaving the Suns.
Solomon had three years remaining on his contract. Malceski had two years to run.
The arrival of 2018 ‘Super Draft’ teens Izak Rankine, Jack Lukosius and Ben King has largely helped stabilise the club from an on-field perspective.
But the Suns are set to complete their 11th AFL season without ever playing finals.
Gold Coast is 4-7 after round 11, which is slightly behind where it was last year.
Miller monster guides Suns past Hawks
—Daniel Garb
In the barren surrounds of the SCG, a masterful performance from Touk Miller has led Gold Coast to a much needed 37 point win over a poor Hawthorn outfit that breaks a Suns three game losing run.
In another torturous episode in Hawthorn’s 2021 season, for what was their fifth loss in a row, they were blown away early by three first quarter Izak Rankine goals in a best of the season display from the former number three draft pick which coincided with Indigenous Round across the AFL.
He would finish with a career high haul of four all up in a reminder of the talents that took the AFL world by storm in his first season.
“People look at the goals column but there have been other games where he’s been high in goal assists and score assists for us so we thought a performance like this wasn’t far away,” Gold Coast coach Stuart Dew said.
“It’s always good to see the Indigenous lads play well on this particular weekend,” he continued.
While the quarter time margin was only nine points, the Hawks looked a far inferior side throughout, as Miller in particular continued his sensational season by seemingly toying with the Hawks midfield to finish with 37 possessions and 10 score involvements to maintain the pace for his first All-Australian blazer.
The quarter time margin was extended to 28 points at the main break as Ben King in particular started to take charge up forward for Gold Coast, kicking truly to help them arrest back momentum and then setting up two majors for teammates in Alex Sexton and Nick Holman.
From there it was simply a matter of how many the Suns would win by as Jack Lukosius started to star with his intercept marking and accurate kicking off half back and King continued his dominance up forward as he finished with four goals as well to match Rankine while Alex Sexton chimed in with three.
Jack Scrimshaw provided some class for the Hawks against his former side across halfback while Liam Shiels with 26 possessions and Chad Wingard with 24 battled away, but there were too few polished performers in brown and gold as they remain in 17th place on the table.
THOSE 2020 VIBES
The empty expanses of the SCG, populated by no more than 1000 people, mainly of Hawthorn fandom for two teams with no connection to the host city were a stark reminder that the bizarre 2020 Covid affected season was not one in isolation. It was a hollow sound inside the famous old ground and with more games of this nature to now be played over the next week or so, footy fans are adjusting to the cold nature of Covid affected games once more.
BIG BEN HURT
Ben King was a star performer in the Suns win, kicking four goals and setting up a couple more when the game was there to be won. His high marking game and zip away from the contest for a man of 202 centimetres was a feature but he was unfortunately cut down to size in the third term when a stray fist from Chad Wingard caught him in the most uncomfortable of areas. After hunching over for a couple of minutes he had to leave the ground in the hands of trainers to let the pain subside.
REEVES PROVIDES RESPITE
Amid the toughest of seasons they’ve endured in some time Hawks fans are trying to find some solace in whatever youngsters can emerge from the rubble. In 211 centimetre Ned Reeves they are afforded some respite. The 22 year old beanpole ruckman looks a real find finishing with 34 hit-outs for the night and showed that he can offer something up forward with a big second quarter pack mark and goal.
SCOREBOARD
GOLD COAST: 4.5, 10.8, 13.10, 17.11 (113)
def
HAWTHORN: 3.2, 6.4, 8.5, 11.10 (76)
GOALS
Suns: Rankine, King 4, Sexton 3, Burgess, Holman, Lukosious, Miller, Ellis, Weller
Hawks: Moore, Lewis, McEvoy 2, Reeves, Worpel, Lewis, Phillips, Breust, Greaves, Reeves
DANIEL GARB’S BEST
Suns: Miller, Lukosious, King, Rankine, Ellis, Markov, Sexton, Swallow.
Hawks: Scrimshaw, McEvoy, Moore, Wingard, Worpel, Reeves.
DANIEL GARB’S VOTES
3 — T Miller
2 — J Lukosius
1 — I Rankine
Originally published as AFL 2021: Hawks legend Alastair Clarkson pulls handbrake on Sam Mitchell, citing timing as crucial
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