Nathan Buckley Q&A: Former Collingwood coach opens up on his Magpies exit, salary cap saga regrets, Adam Treloar, Eddie McGuire and more

In April 2021, Nathan Buckley had a ‘Come to Jesus moment’ with footy boss Graham Wright. He opens up on what happened leading up to it – and how it resulted in ‘greater good’.

Nathan Buckley has opened up on his exit from Collingwood. Picture: Michael Klein

Collingwood legend Nathan Buckley says he now realises he had to move on for the “greater good” of the club.

Buckley’s almost three-decade association with the Magpies came to an end when he walked away as senior coach in June 2021.

“My belief is that there needed to be change for us to be able to take the next step (out of the malaise of the 2020 post-season),” Buckley said this week.

“I’ve got no doubt that both Ed (McGuire) and I were lightning rods in different ways. We’d been positioned externally. I always thought that Ed was going to need to step aside for new growth, but I didn’t realise that I needed to do it as well (laughs).

“And when I had that Come to Jesus moment with Wrighty (Collingwood football boss Graham Wright in April 2021), I very quickly understood that ‘yeah, this is exactly what needs to happen here for the greater good.”

In a wide-ranging interview ahead of the club’s finals campaign, Buckley opens up on his regrets at being the frontman of the 2020 salary cap debacle, why “something wasn’t quite right” in season 2021 and how new coach Craig McRae, chief executive Craig Kelly, president Jeff Browne and Wright are the “right people” to lead the Pies resurgence.

Nathan Buckley stepped down as Collingwood coach in 2021. Picture: Getty Images

Michael Warner: Are you surprised at Collingwood’s progress?

Nathan Buckley: “They’ve exceeded my expectations. Back in ‘21 it wasn’t a happy place. The locker room wasn’t happy. The club wasn’t happy. I wasn’t happy. Add in Covid, the trade period and ‘Do Better’ – there was just too much going on in our space, and it’s so marginal at the top, we just didn’t have our ducks in a row.

“We had built off this inclusive, caring environment – what everyone is still seeing now is what we had built and who we are – but the hard-nosed decisions that had to be made at the end of 2020 did not reflect that.

“In leadership you’ve got to make hard decisions that are unpopular at the time – and whilst they were the right decisions – they definitely weren’t managed as well as we could have done.

“We absolutely did what we had to do but if I had my time again I wouldn’t have been the frontman with Adam (Treloar). I would have stayed well away from it because it wasn’t a coaching decision. It was a salary cap decision but I just wanted to front up to it and take responsibility for everything.”

MW: Was that right – to take responsibility – in hindsight?

NB: “Politically, no. But I had the relationship with Ads – we had travelled a journey from the under 16s for Vic Country way back when, we’d stayed in touch when he was at GWS – our connection was probably a significant reason why he came to Collingwood. It was a ruthless decision in amongst this ideal of care and support.

“We valued the person above the footballer and then all of a sudden we are expecting the person to understand that it’s a football decision.

“We didn’t feel all that great about it and weren’t able to pull it back together quick enough in the early stages of 21.”

MW: Have you been able to speak to Adam?

NB: “No, I haven’t. I’ve learned you are responsible for half of a relationship. But I understand why he feels the way he feels and if in time he wants to reach out or we get a chance to unpack it, then I’m more than happy to do it. He’s a good man.”

MW: Eddie left and then you left. Was it just the right time for change?

NB: “I think so. I’ve had the belief lately that I could have fought my way out of it and through it. But I took a step back and took a look at where I was and where the club was – and the feedback that had come back, both positive and negative, which had brought Wrighty into a position of having that chat with me about going forward, and that ‘we reckon we need to go elsewhere. We reckon we need to move beyond you as senior coach’.

“So that was over a couple of chats over a couple of weeks and I reckon I could have fought it – ‘what do we need to fix?’ But I thought on the balance of it he was probably right and there was enough of a mandate for change and that the time was right just to take another important piece out of it just to allow for fresh growth.”

Graeme Wright and Nathan Buckley worked closely on the coach’s exit from Collingwood. Picture: Michael Klein

MW: Was it a surprise the first time Wright mentioned that to you?

NB: “Yes, but if I’m being totally honest I wasn’t absolutely at ease myself. I wasn’t happy at the club for probably a large part of that ‘21 pre-season anyway.”

MW: Why is that?

NB: “I had my own resentment around the trade period and the role that I felt like had been imposed on me and the decisions we were forced into. And the ‘Do Better’ report, and that I was a focus of that from outside of the footy club, that weighed on me, and so I don’t think I was the best version of myself and that impacted my ability to do the job and connect with people right when they needed a little bit more consistent and stable support. I was probably idling at 6 or 7 out of 10 instead of being the 8 or 9 that I had been for most of my time.”

MW: Is that in hindsight?

NB: “A little bit. But I knew it enough when I was talking to Wrighty.”

MW: Can you take me inside that first chat with Graham Wright?

NB: “We had an initial chat and said let’s go and do some vox popping and see what the feeling is around the place. I was an equal partner in wanting that feedback. I’ve always wanted the feedback and something wasn’t quite right. We didn’t start the year well … we weren’t popping and so I reckon that first convo was around Round 5 or 6 … we came back around about a month later and it was over the course of a week that we made the call and then another three or four days to say that I wasn’t going to continue (until the end of the season) – and that was on me. Wrighty was fantastic. I’d been trying to get him back to the club for ages and so there was a great irony in the fact he managed me out (laughs)…”

MW: Can you remember where you were and what he first said about your future?

NB: “Yeah. He handed me a one pager in his office, which was a summary of five or six areas. A couple of positives, a couple of negatives in regards to my role. I had a read of it there and then.

MW: Can you remember how you felt?

NB: “Yeah. I understood it.”

MW: Was it a lightning bolt moment?

NB: “Yeah it was, it doesn’t matter who you are. It was confronting, but Wrighty was awesome. We had a close win against the Crows after that chat and then came around again and made some decisions in the days leading into the Sydney game.”

MW: How did the salary cap get mucked up so badly?

NB: “I’ve got my theories but I don’t know. I think it was a bit of a perfect storm. We improved really quickly and that triggered some performance contracts. My understanding through 2019 was that we were going to have to lose a big money player but when we got to the end of that year we had found a way to keep them all. As a coach, if you tell me that we’ve found a way to keep all of our players, I was happy with that.”

Adam Treloar left Collingwood as part of the salary cap saga fallout. Picture: AAP Images

MW: But you were kicking the can down the road?

NB: “That’s evident.”

MW: Would you describe it as mismanagement?

NB: “I wouldn’t. I won’t give you that word but we could have handled it better. I never wanted to know what the players were on. The salary cap was for other roles in the footy program. So, when that can started getting kicked? I’m not too sure. But I know where it stopped.”

MW: Eddie McGuire was a formidable figure at the club. Was it also time for him to go?

NB: “I understand the narrative on Ed, both internally and externally – that he can be overbearing and headstrong. He was continually coming up with ideas on how the club could be better. There’s a lot of people who love him and a lot who hate him. I’ve always respected the bloke. He’s the most optimistic bloke I’ve ever met in his capacity to let his worst situations go and just march forward, like water off a duck’s back and that attitude has got him a long way in life and I think it helped the club a lot – for a lot of his years. I’m not privy to how the board operated or what the governance was like at the top, but he was pretty headstrong and I’m sure if he had an idea it would often come to fruition – for good or bad.”

MW: Has it helped Collingwood that Eddie is no longer there?

NB: “My belief is that there needed to be change for us to be able to take the next step. I’ve got no doubt that both Ed and I were lightning rods in different ways. We’d been positioned externally. I always thought that Ed was going to need to step aside for new growth, but I didn’t realise that I needed to do it as well (laughs). And when I had that Come to Jesus moment with Wrighty, I very quickly understood that ‘yeah, this is exactly what needs to happen here for the greater good.”

MW: Jeff Browne replaced him. How much credit should he take?

NB: “I don’t know a lot about Jeff but he’s obviously as passionate as anyone about Collingwood. I actually sat in front of him and Tom (Browne) when Collingwood played Freo this year. I sat with Ned. It was the first time Ned and I had actually sat at the footy together and Jeff was just an absolute barracker. It was awesome. He was out of his seat and Ned was saying, ‘He’s nuts’. But he’s passionate about the club, which is great to see. So, you can be all that but the role of president is how do you galvanise and pull out all of the attributes of your board? And from what Ned tells me Jeff is as good as he’s seen in his time at being able to have people in the room bring their respective skill sets for the betterment of the organisation that they are governing. You can’t say much more about someone if they have that capacity. You need the right dose of ego and perspective to be able to do that.”

Buckley could tell there were issues at the Magpies throughout the early stages of 2021. Picture: Michael Klein

MW: And to get Craig Kelly as CEO after that?

NB: “It was just timing. Ned is a savvy businessman and whilst he’s held an influential position in football generally through management, events and his association with the AFL, he’s always loved Collingwood and he feels indebted to Collingwood. At some point it was always in the back of his mind and in his heart that he would love to come back and help the place – and I think he feels like he really can. With the journey he has travelled and the experiences that he’s gathered – and I know that he’s already had a tremendous impact on the club. They love him. He’s equal parts manic and cracking the whip and disciplinarian – but then loving and caring. He’s the biggest-hearted tough prick going around and quite often you find that with the toughest guys who have the softest insides. The reflections that I get from the staff is that things just get done – and they are expected to get done now.”

MW: How important has his appointment been?

NB: “Huge. Collingwood are a big, powerful club. Ego in footy is fascinating. You need enough of it to have belief in yourself, but too much and you cut yourself off at the knees. And Ned is fair. He’ll still go to the negotiating table and be hard, but he’s also fair. He’s looking for win-wins. He’s not about chest-beating or ego. I think the club is in great shape.”

MW: What about the playing group?

NB: “Pendlebury, Sidebottom, Howe, Adams, Maynard, Elliott and Moore, the heart of the playing group, have been as influential in building what the club now is as anyone at the top. Darcy was in our leadership group, he was intelligent and had a great perspective and footy was important to him – but it’s never been everything. He seemed to feel more comfortable in the environment as he went along and felt more and more entitled to stand in front of it to the point where he was happy to put his hand up to do it (the captaincy). He and Jordan Roughead in particular – along with Brodes (Grundy) and even a guy like Tom Langdon – were the social conscience of the playing group because they are very progressive. They would often hold the management to account in certain areas. When the ‘Do Better’ report came out, I remember having a meeting with all the players and staff – because we needed to address it – and we were all at various levels of embarrassed, ashamed and angry. The last domino to fall (for Darcy) was his acceptance of what the reality was, accepting what the club had been in some way and deciding that he wanted to be a leader for the better. In my mind, that is a big part of it (the resurgence).

“Throughout my time at Collingwood – and I noticed it more when I was a coach – there just increasingly became a disconnect between the football department, including players and staff, and their faith in leadership. To the point where we really built from the inside out. It was the players and staff taking more ownership for the environment and behaving in the way that we wanted it to be. I think that was the genesis of the new Collingwood.”

Buckley and Eddie McGuire left soon after each other. Picture: AAP Images

MW: So it’s been players driven, you think?

NB: “Absolutely. Absolutely. It went from the bottom of the pyramid right to the top. And if you can imagine a wave coming from the bottom through the top … and I’ve been flushed out, but I think I’d like to think that I was a part of the wave. When I accepted the job I wanted to do two things – win lots of games of footy and have people walk out better for their experiences at the club, which is why Adam Treloar hurts me. But by doing that the deeper purpose, what I was hoping to do – I wanted the club to change. I didn’t want it to be the same club that it was when I left that it was when I started because we needed to change.”

MW: So you have a sense of pride in what has now happened?

NB: “Bloody oath, I do. And I don’t feel like I am just consoling myself with that. The appointment of Fly (Craig McRae) – what we built and what I was a part of – he is more naturally taking that on. It was nearly against my nature.”

MW: What do you mean by that?

NB: “Because I was more critical by nature. I look for what’s not right rather than what is right. So he is more naturally what we had become and he’s just taken it to another level.”

MW: Have you spoken to him at all?

NB: “We’ve had a few chats but nothing in depth. I’ve sent him a few messages here and there, three or four last year maybe, and he’d flick something back and in the end, at the granny actually in the September Club, we had a quick chat. He deserves all the credit that he’s getting.”

MW: Now that you are in the media, and not coaching and have kids who barrack for Collingwood, like Jeff Browne, are you a Pies barracker these days?

NB: “I’m more circumspect, I think. But I didn’t realise how invested I was until the qualifying final last year, in the middle of the last quarter. We were broadcasting at the game, but I wasn’t calling, and Taylor Adams rips his groin and we go and lose that game and I thought, ‘sh**’. I feel like there’s still a strong connection with that playing group. They are f***ing enormously resilient – all of them. They’ve gone close. My whole career I was close but didn’t get there. And these boys outside of Pendles and Steele have travelled this journey and haven’t got there. So I want to see them get rewarded because I know how much work they have put in – how much commitment they have made in a personal sense, let alone in a professional sense. 2018, ‘19, ‘22 – you look at those years and think, ‘Well, there’s three really narrow losses that have either taken one away or give you the chance at another couple. I’d love to see them rewarded but there are no guarantees.”

Buckley and Scott Pendlebury during his final season in charge. Picture: Getty Images

MW: One last one. Nick Daicos. How amazing is it to be that good so early in your career?

NB: “Everything that has been said about him is spot on. He starts as an outside player playing off halfback – not asked to defend but get involved in our offence – throw him forward every now and then and he kicks a goal when you need one, and then you throw him in the middle and he starts winning his own ball, clearances, going from the inside to the outside. There’s a lot of the way that the team plays that is built off his attributes. He must be coached really well and I think he’s been brought up really well. Once again, that great balance between ego and confidence with the selflessness to understand that he’s not the whole team. He’s a rare combination. If you zoom out and look at the bigger picture, maybe Collingwood’s ego has always got ahead of accepting what needs to happen in the moment. Maybe ego has been a big issue for Collingwood. But I think we’ve balanced it now because you don’t want to remove ego altogether because then it doesn’t matter to you. Browne, Wright, Kelly, McRae – they seem to have found the right balance.

“I mean, Fly (McRae) has a really strong ego – there’s an inner belief there. A f***ing bulldog in that little poodle. I know him well enough to know. There’s always been a little chip there, someone who has been perennially overlooked and underestimated and I think that’s part of the fuel that he’s got. He’s a winner. So, they’ve got the right people to do it.”

Originally published as Nathan Buckley Q&A: Former Collingwood coach opens up on his Magpies exit, salary cap saga regrets, Adam Treloar, Eddie McGuire and more