AFL 2021: Assistant coaches decisions could handcuff Hawks salary cap
The Hawks owe Clarkson as much as $900k after this season which could spell soft cap disaster should key assistant coaches decide to move on from the club.
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Hawthorn assistant coach Brendon Bolton has no plans to depart the club alongside Alastair Clarkson at season’s end.
Bolton, who is in charge of the midfield group, remains contracted for next season at Waverley and has reaffirmed his commitment to the brown and gold in recent talks to help fast-track the rebuild under new coach Sam Mitchell.
But back line coach Chris Newman remains unsigned for next season and has fielded interest from rivals as he weighs up the next step in his coaching career.
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Newman has been linked to a move back to Richmond where he played 268 games and was
captain between 2009-2012, but Mitchell would not want to lose the popular lieutenant.
Bolton has been closely aligned to Clarkson and accepted his offer to rejoin Hawthorn’s assistant coaching ranks after he was sacked from Carlton midway through 2019.
In any case, Hawthorn is unlikely to want to commit to another pay out for a contracted coach as the club still has to hand over as much as $900,000 to Clarkson which counts in the soft cap in the 2022-23 seasons.
If Clarkson accepts a new senior coaching job in that time the Hawks will have to make up any shortfall.
However, if Clarkson takes time off next year he will continue to be paid by the Hawks.
The premiership mastermind was contracted until next year but last week stepped away from the proposed succession plan.
His payout will handcuff the Hawks slightly in terms of their football department soft cap spending but the club will be in full-on rebuild mode and will focus heavily on the draft and development.
Craig McRae, who looks after the forwards, is also one of the most highly-rated assistant coaches in the country and will be an asset for Mitchell.
The Hawks are currently slated to have the No.2 pick in the draft as they sit second-last on the ladder.
However, they could jump up several spots if they can knock off Collingwood in Launceston on Sunday, followed by tougher assignments against Western Bulldogs and Richmond to finish the season.
THE LAST DEAL BETWEEN CLARKO AND KENNETT
Alastair Clarkson was given the choice to coach out the season at Hawthorn or quit immediately as the club confirmed on Monday he was determined to finish his tenure in Round 23.
Sunday’s victory over Brisbane might have been the perfect way to call time on his Hawthorn career but he was back at Waverley Park on Monday preparing to take on Collingwood next week.
That clash with Collingwood would be a perfect audition for Clarkson, who told the Pies football boss recently he was not interested in the Magpies’ vacant role.
The Pies hierarchy will sound out Clarkson again given his changing circumstances and brilliant coaching pedigree.
Securing Clarkson would also be a massive boost for the existing board as it fights a group attempting to launch an extraordinary general meeting.
The Hawks are hopeful the easing of crowd restrictions in coming weeks will allow them to farewell Clarkson and Shaun Burgoyne in the same manner as Essendon said goodbye to Kevin Sheedy and James Hird in 2007.
In that Round 23 match the Dons staged a frantic late challenge against reigning premiers West Coast as Hird won 34 possessions in his last game before a standing ovation from the Subiaco crowd.
The previous week an amazing 88,468 fans were at the MCG as the Dons lost to Richmond in their last home game in Melbourne.
Hawthorn president Jeff Kennett confirmed on Tuesday Clarkson was intent on coaching out the season to help support the playing group.
“That is my understanding. He has agreed to coach out the end of year and we have agreed on that,” he said.
Former Hawks coach Peter Schwab made a similar decision after his sacking and lasted only one game, but Clarkson is determined to fulfil his contract for 2021.
New coach Sam Mitchell has promised “an enormous amount of change” over the summer but made clear he wanted to keep senior players including captain Ben McEvoy, Luke Breust and Liam Shiel.
“We are going to go to the drawing board, we will have a lot of new staff and have a lot of planning and developing with the way we want to play, with how we want our structures and leadership to look,” he said.
“There is going to be an enormous amount of change with a head coach.”
“Part of the speed at which we want to try to rebuild this program and playing group is that we have we got some really good experienced players, the Ben McEvoys and Luke Breusts and the Liam Shiels of the group. They bring such great leadership so the more games we can get into players playing alongside some of our veterans the quicker they can improve.”
Suns chief responds to latest Clarkson link
Gold Coast chief executive Mark Evans says there was nothing unusual behind his decision to sit among the Suns’ coaching staff only days after master coach Alastair Clarkson announced his departure from Hawthorn.
Evans’ presence in the Suns’ statisticians’ box sparked suggestions the Suns were conducting a forensic review of the football department including senior coach Stuart Dew.
Evans watched on as the Suns suffered one of their worst losses under Dew on Sunday as Melbourne belted Gold Coast by 98 points at Marvel Stadium.
It followed a tumultuous 24 hours for the Suns, who were quickly hurried onto a flight to Melbourne to escape the southeast Queensland lockdown following an emergency call-out on Saturday.
It meant players didn’t have dinner until 10pm in Melbourne and were still being Covid tested after midnight. Some staff did not make the trip and luggage also went missing.
Evans said there was significant disruption for the team but was adamant his presence in the stats box was not part of a formal review into Dew’s position and had “zero” to do with Clarkson’s situation.
“I have been in the box on a few occasions this year including the last time when we were down here for the game against Richmond,” Evans said.
“It would mostly occur when we are on the road and certainly when there is no crowd and no functions it is more likely to occur.
“We had staff missing on the day, so for a while there I thought I might even have to go back to my old days of running the rotations off the bench.
“But in the times that I have done it I have found it is good practice for a CEO to do this a few times a year in any case.
“It had zero to do with that (Clarkson).”
Clarkson will continue to be linked to the Suns’ job with former St Kilda great Leigh Montagna suggesting the Suns should throw $2.5 million a year at Clarkson as part of an offer he can’t refuse.
Dew is contracted at the Suns until the end of next year, and it remains unclear whether the club will look to extend him in the early part of next season.
Clarkson confirmed he is available to coach another club next season but said on Friday he was unsure what the future held.
Gold Coast is under pressure to lift out of the bottom part of the ladder and contend for their first ever finals berth after an underwhelming first decade in the league.
Evans said the Suns would learn from a difficult weekend.
“We are committed to do anything we can to make the club better,” he said.
“If that means analysing how we dealt with the last 48 hours and what we did right and what we have got to do better, then we are committed to review that every time we have to.
“It has been a tough 48 hours for us and to deal with all of those logistics it is fair to say we didn’t cope well with that and I think that came out in our performance.
“There are many things as a club we are trying to get better at, some issues we have seen across the year such as being able to stem the tide when the opposition team is going well.
“We have been working on that and the games against Richmond, GWS and Western Bulldogs we can see some improvement in that.
“But it is still an issue where we have not been able to do that (stem the tide) on enough times.”
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