Leigh Matthews has pointed the finger at coaches for the congestion in the game
AFL great Leigh Matthews has pointed the finger at the coaches for the congestion in the game, saying the game is now over-coached and favours forcing players to start in position.
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AFL great Leigh Matthews has pointed the finger at the coaches for the congestion in the game.
He’s not levelling all responsibility on the current crop of coaches, but also at the masterminds since the turn of the century who have helped transform the game into heavy congested and “bubble” football.
“They, the coaches, played a 100 per cent role,” Matthews told the Herald Sun.
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“Everything which has happened is a product of full-time footy, full-time coaching, a lot of coaches trying to find a way to win. That’s their job.
“Everything going on in footy about the on-field game is a product of the way the coaches want to coach their players to play.
“The game has to try to reduce the coaches’ ability to tactically change it.
“It’s already gone because buggered if I know how you put the genie back in the bottle.”
Matthews, considered the game’s greatest player and who coached Brisbane to three premierships before the arrival of heavy defensive tactics, is urging changes to open up the game.
Laying responsibility at the feet of the coaches flies in the face of AFL Coaches Association boss Mark Brayshaw who said this week coaches were not to blame for any aesthetic problems in the game.
“It’s a bit rich to blame the coaches,” Brayshaw said.
Former players and coaches, including Matthews, Malcolm Blight, David Parkin, Garry Lyon and Jonathan Brown, have been central to the debate this week about the state of play, with Matthews and Blight urging a six-six-six format after each goal is scored to open up the ground.
But Geelong coach Chris Scott indicated the game was not in crisis.
“I think the notion that the game is in dire straights is in the most part old people looking at what the game used to be with rose coloured glasses,” Scott said.
Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley said instead of introducing more rules, the AFL should apply the current rules as they are “meant to be applied”.
“We just don’t reward the tackler the way we used to,” Buckley said on SEN. “I think that’s as responsible for congestion as anything.
“If teams want to handball in a short space to get numbers into that congestion and they want to handball and take the tackles on, if you possess the ball but you don’t kick or handball it, then it’s a free kick against.’’
Matthews believes the defensive nature of Australian Rules changed about 2005, via expanding coaching departments.
“Towards the end of the 1990s, football became full-time which meant coaches became full-time which led to increased coaching departments,” Matthews said.
“From 2005 to 2010, two things happened. The interchange went from 20-30 to I suspect 70 or 80 to get more energy from players on the field ... and then the press part came into play under Mick Malthouse at Collingwood, through 09, 10, 11
“Those two things happened and they were all coach driven.”
Matthews argued the introduction of the centre square in the early 1970s to combat congestion in the centre of the ground, which developed after legendary Hawthorn coach John Kennedy moved his forwards on ball to give more room to full-forward Peter Hudson, was a wonderful success.
To try to combat today’s congestion, Matthews favours starting positions after each goal and is not opposed to starting positions at every stoppage.
“The solution to congestion is a question and not an answer,” he said.
“No one’s got the solution to where the coaches have taken the game and the question is: Do we like where they have taken the game?
“It’s a good discussion point, but the next discussion point is what we do about it.”
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