SACKED podcast: Daniel Harford calls for better pay for AFLW assistant coaches

In the latest SACKED podcast, former Carlton AFLW coach Daniel Harford has revealed his big concern about the problem he thinks is holding the competition’s development back.

Daniel Harford fears low wages are slowing down the improvement of AFLW.

Former Carlton AFLW coach Daniel Harford has urged the league to get serious about funding coaching panels given AFLW assistant coaches are often paid less than a third of men’s suburban coaches.

Harford is encouraged by the continued increase in standard of the AFLW but says the league still doesn’t know what it wants the competition to look like.

Daniel Harford wants AFLW assistant coaches to be paid more.

He says AFLW assistant coaches are paid “peanuts” when they are responsible for so much of the growth in development and strategy of a competition in just its ninth season.

“One of my biggest bugbears was we paid our assistant coaches peanuts. Absolute peanuts to commit however many hours a week to do it. And they did it because they loved footy and they wanted to be a part of this,” he told the Sacked podcast.

“But you need good, rock-solid quality coaches to come in and teach these players their fundamentals and the basics and then extend it into the intricacies of modern footy.

“And you can’t do that with people for minimum chips, because they have got lives.

They might be paid a minimum of $7500 and maybe $10,000 maximum. You can go to a local footy club and get $30,000 and be under nowhere near as much pressure and not the time commitments.

“So in my opinion, invest in coaching your players or they don’t develop anywhere near as quickly, therefore your product is inferior, and you slow the whole thing down.”