Audio emerges of Hawthorn chief executive saying there would be no ‘Kirribilli’ coaching agreement at the club
How long has the Hawthorn succession plan been in the works? Audio has emerged of Justin Reeves making a big declaration just one month ago.
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Audio has emerged of Hawthorn chief executive Justin Reeves declaring just a month ago that a “Kirribilli”-style coaching agreement would not be adopted at the Hawks.
Appearing on ABC radio on June 11, Reeves, a Collingwood executive at the time of the infamous 2011 Mick Malthouse-Nathan Buckley transfer-of-power arrangement, said: “Our view as the Hawthorn Football Club, and not speaking for Collingwood, has been that there has never been an agreement or a Kirribilli agreement or the like, because we just don’t think that that’s the right thing for anyone”.
Pressed during the ABC interview on whether Collingwood’s decision to end Nathan Buckley’s tenure had pushed forward “any time line with Sam Mitchell”, Reeves replied: “Not one inch.”
But Hawks chiefs this week conceded that the opening of the coaching position at Collingwood had indeed fast-tracked the decision making process around the future of Alastair Clarkson after the four-time premiership coach approached the club about his contract situation.
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However, Hawthorn will argue that there was no “Kirribilli agreement” struck with Mitchell because he was not offered the job until after the board had informed Clarkson that his contract would not be extended beyond season 2022.
Coaching great Mick Malthouse told the Herald Sun on Wednesday that Hawthorn had “panicked” in the same way Collingwood did 12 years ago by enforcing the Clarkson- Mitchell succession plan.
Malthouse said he saw worrying similarities between this week’s Hawthorn manoeuvres and the 2009 arrangement that led to Buckley taking charge of the Magpies at the end of 2011.
“Both clubs didn’t want to lose their favourite sons, so the most obvious thing to do is keep them at the club – and the only way you can do that is to offer them what they want, which is the senior job,” Malthouse said.
But former Magpies president Eddie McGuire, the man who masterminded the Malthouse-Buckley arrangement in 2009, rejected the Malthouse claims.
“Let me tell you once and for all what happened, OK,” McGuire told Footy Classified.
“I love Mick Malthouse. I was accused at the time of being too loyal to him … that I was sticking by him all the way, because he rebuilt our club twice and saved the Collingwood Football Club.
“I thought there were things happening in Mick’s life. I thought his health and that the stress of the job – he talks about it even today, about the aspect of what happened at Carlton and around the place even at West Coast, even at the Dogs – had on the impact on the family. I could see that.
“I had a meeting with his manager, Peter Sidwell, and I said: ‘How do you think our boy’s going?’ He said ‘yeah I’m a bit worried’. I said: ‘Yep, so am I. What do you reckon?’ We kicked around some ideas around a couple of meetings.
“One of the things we came up with was how do we get the best out of Mick Malthouse for the long-term? We came up with an idea that part of it would be coaching and then it would be a chairman of selectors-type role, even coming onto the board of the Collingwood Football Club.
“If I had my way, Mick Malthouse would still be at Collingwood and we would have got through it. Now, Mick got two years into it and he did a great job. Preliminary final, premiers, Grand Final. But the next period he decided ‘no, I still want to go on’. We knew the fire was burning. As soon as that happened, I let him out of his contract.
“People don’t sign a five-year contract unless they’re all in on it.”
‘WHY AM I HERE?’ INSIDE PIES’ FAILED SUCCESSION PLAN
Coaching great Mick Malthouse says Hawthorn has “panicked” in the same way Collingwood did 12 years ago by enforcing the Alastair Clarkson-Sam Mitchell succession plan.
Malthouse said he saw worrying similarities between this week’s Hawthorn manoeuvres and the 2009 arrangement that led to Nathan Buckley taking charge of the Magpies at the end of 2011.
“Both clubs didn’t want to lose their favourite sons, so the most obvious thing to do is keep them at the club – and the only way you can do that is to offer them what they want, which is the senior job,” Malthouse told the Herald Sun.
“There are very strong similarities and I think they (Hawthorn) have been pressured and I would use the word panic, which is unusual for Hawthorn.
“But it seems to be a very quick response and no doubt Mitchell would have mentioned that he had at least been sounded out about the Collingwood job.”
Asked if the Pies had also panicked in conjuring the infamous Buckley succession plan, Malthouse said: “There’s no doubt they did. It would have been, ‘Well, geez, we can’t lose our favourite son. What’s he want? He wants the senior coaching job’, so there’s a bit of panic involved. We’ll move the chairs around”.
Collingwood’s transfer-of-power plan became complicated after Malthouse led his team to the 2010 premiership.
Malthouse said he suspected Hawks president Jeff Kennett dominated his board in the same way Eddie McGuire did at Collingwood.
“That is an outsider’s observation but I have no real proof,” Malthouse said.
“Then you’ve got two former club captains, albeit one was dethroned as captain being Mitchell, and that would be something they might want to have investigated, so you’ve got Brownlow medallists, best-and-fairest winners, one (Mitchell) is a premiership player and one (Buckley) is not, but played very well in a grand final.
“I don’t know how close Kennett is to Mitchell, is it as close as McGuire was to Buckley? Probably not, but McGuire didn’t want to lose Buckley, who had been interviewed by North Melbourne, but would he have got the North Melbourne job? No idea. Only North could tell you that.
“Would Mitchell have got the Collingwood job? The hint I heard was no.”
Malthouse said he believed Clarkson, for all his standing in the game, would find next season difficult.
“When he sits in recruitment meetings, let me tell you, I was astounded,” he said.
“You were basically a back-seat driver while all around you Nathan and Geoff Walsh and Derek Hine are all talking about the takeover and ‘what sort of players do you want’? And I’m thinking, ‘Geez, we are still two years away from this. I’m trying to win as many games as I can for this football club’ – and I reckon as they sit down at Hawthorn to discuss the future, Clarkson is going to be thinking, ‘Why am I here? I’m just a bystander’, and that’s the first hint that gets you.
“I think he will be feeling very apprehensive, but if there were subtle differences it would be more where we were on the ladder compared to where Hawthorn are.”
Malthouse said then Collingwood chief executive Gary Pert “made no secret of it that I was no longer the coach, even though I was still coaching”.
“I had very little contact with Pert, he wore the carpet out walking past my office into Nathan’s area, but on reflection it was understandable, because even though we were fighting off in a grand final, you are only temporarily occupying that spot,” he said.
“It’s hard to explain, because you are so absorbed in your playing group and the staff around you that you want to win for them and your supporters, but all the other things are forever a reminder.
“I never looked at the board again the same way and I reckon Clarkson will feel exactly the same.
“The effect on the players is also monumental. They are very much affected by it, too.”
Asked if Hawthorn had made a mistake, Malthouse said: “The proof is always in the pudding. Two years into it, you’ll have some indication of whether it has worked.
“But when you drive the car and you have a front seat passenger, who is the assistant coach, and then you take your hand off the steering wheel, take your foot off the accelerator and brake, and they yell out, ‘What are you doing?’ and you say, ‘Well, you’re taking over’ – it’s a major difference between sitting there and sunning yourself in the passenger seat and having to steer, accelerate and brake and all of the bits and pieces that actually go with driving the truck.
“There is a coaching ingredient that is not taught, it’s intangible and it’s how you relate to players and how players relate to you to get the best out of them.
“That is an unknown and greatness of playing doesn’t necessarily mean greatness of coaching.”
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