‘Going to complain’: Sacked coach calls for audit after AFLW truth bomb

Sacked Bulldogs coach Nathan Burke has exposed a secretive, shadowy side of the AFLW competition, dropping a brutal truth bomb.

Sacked Western Bulldogs AFLW coach Nathan Burke has called on the AFL to conduct a training audit of clubs amid vast discrepancies between the league’s superpowers and battlers with a series of season nine blowouts.

The ninth AFLW home-and-away season has ended with a two-tiered competition in which three clubs won only a single game while Hawthorn, North Melbourne and Brisbane dropped only one or two games.

Despite the standard of the competition continuing to lift each year a series of one-sided contests took some of the gloss off the drama.

Burke told the Herald Sun’s Sacked podcast he still sees a future for the AFLW where players are on excellent wages but not officially full-time given many want to continue in part-time jobs or study.

PART 1: NATHAN BURKE REVEALS HIS ROLE IN TIGERS’ 2017 GLORY

PART 2: INSIDE ROSS LYON’S SHOCK FREMANTLE MOVE

Burke was axed from the Bulldogs after the 2023 season. Picture: Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images

But he says some playing groups are determined to stick to the AFL-mandated training limit, while others start a full pre-season in February and are prepared to go over and above with more sessions to get into elite shape.

Burke called out his playing group for a lack of fitness in his final season in 2023 and had to apologise to the group in a development that hurt his prospects of retaining his job.

The limit on contact hours at clubs this season was 22 per week and will lift to 25 next season.

“There is a group that wants it to be full time football and there is another group who likes playing footy but also loves working at the local cafe and loves going to uni and says, ‘There is a ceiling I am actually going to put on this’, Burke told Sacked.

“So you have a dichotomy of players within your group. Some say why can’t we train every day. Others are saying, ‘Hang on, I can only be here 20 hours a week’. Don’t ask me to be here for 21 hours because I am going to complain’. So you are juggling that and if you have got a really militant AFLPA person (delegate) you have to stick to that.

“And then you look down the road at clubs who don’t have that person and if you are allowed to train 20 hours a week, they are doing 25.

“I hope to goodness someone within the AFL at the end of this season does an audit on what teams are doing.”

Burke called out his players for a lack of fitness in 2023. Picture: Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images

AFLW coaches have long paid tribute to clubs like Brisbane which are prepared to do weights on official days off but AFLW players cannot be forced to do more than 22 contact hours of training.

“Some teams have been training full on since February, full on in jumpers, twice a week, weekend, two or three sessions a week,” Burke said.

“And there’s others who have been having non compulsory (sessions). You can roll up until the first of June. We’d love to see you. We encourage you to come, but it’s non compulsory. Just come in, run around in your singlets and shorts and everything in between.

“Which teams are going to take a leap forward and which teams are going to go backwards, and what have they been doing in this off-season? Some have been playing VFL. Some have had none playing VFL. So hopefully somebody in the AFL is going to do an audit on what that looks like, because if they don’t get it right, you’re going to have a disparate season for years to come.”

Burke echoed the thoughts of former Carlton AFLW coach Daniel Harford that the AFL needs to better fund assistant coaches to help fast-track the playing standards of the women’s competition.

Burke’s daughter Alice plays at St Kilda. Picture: Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images

“(Senior coaches) are paid between $100,000-$120,000 full time. Depending on what is left in the salary cap assistant coaches get anything from $10,000 to $20,000. $30,000 if you have a really experienced one. So those people have to work. My daughter (Alice) plays at the Saints. They train two days and one night and then on the weekend.

“So those people have to work. But now most clubs might be training twice a week. I know my daughter’s at the Saints. They’re training two days and one night and then a weekend.

“And so if I’m getting $15,000 as an assistant coach and I need to have two days off work and also weekends, it’s not sustainable.

“I had three assistant coaches in five seasons. Every single year I turned over at least two of them, because it’s just not sustainable

“So the AFL Coaches Association and the AFL, they’ve got to come up with an answer to that, because if the players are wanting more, more, more, they want to be taught and you haven’t got the people to do it. So something has got to give.”

Originally published as ‘Going to complain’: Sacked coach calls for audit after AFLW truth bomb