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Stephen Rielly | September 12, 2007
THE appointment of Kevin Sheedy's successor as Essendon coach may not be made until after trade week, with the Dons confirming yesterday that they are prepared to negotiate their way through the October 8-12 window without a senior coach.
With an admission that is certain to be interpreted as further evidence of the club's intention to lure either Mark Williams from Port Adelaide or Mark Thompson from Geelong, Essendon's chief operating officer Travis Auld said there was "every possibility" that Sheedy's seat would still be cold in four weeks' time.
Auld, the head of the Essendon football department and a member of the coaching selection panel that interviewed West Coast assistant coach Peter Sumich yesterday, said the club did not want or need to compromise the search for Sheedy's replacement by setting a pre-trade deadline. Neale Daniher, Chris Bond, Guy McKenna, Matthew Knights and Damien Hardwick also have been interviewed for the job.
"There isn't any formal time line for the coach. It will take as long as it takes," Auld said.
"That's the way you want it to be. You wouldn't want to be hemmed in if it was going to take longer than that to get the right person. If it (the appointment) was made before the trade period, that would be ideal but there's every possibility we won't.
"That's not necessarily a problem, by the way. We have a list manager, Adrian Dodoro, who has been with the club for a long time. We've got a chairman of selectors (Kevin Egan). The only absence on the list committee at the moment is the head coach.
"So we'll take trade week as it comes. There are enough smart football people around the club at the moment to make those decisions in the short term and unless it was a major trade decision, I mean a seriously important deal, then they sort of speak for themselves. Not too many controversial trades go on these days. They're either quite obvious or they don't happen."
Should the appointment be as many as four weeks away, it also will mean that decisions on the careers of a handful of uncontracted players, among them Mark Johnson, Scott Camporeale, Mark Bolton, Chris Heffernan, Richard Cole and Adam Ramanauskas, also will be delayed.
"The first call on the list doesn't have to be made until October 31 and you would think we'll have a coach in place by then and he can have input into the calls that need to be made," Auld said.
"We have some players out of contract and there will be some uncertainty for them but unfortunately that's the game we're in."
A call on Ramanauskas' future may be the first big decision the new coach confronts. The 26-year-old premiership wingman's return to football this year after a series of battles with cancer was one of the feel-good football stories of the season but he returned, with special permission from the AFL Commission and the blessing of the 15 other clubs, as a mature-age rookie.
For next season, he must either be promoted back on to the senior list or delisted and the question that needs to be answered by the new coach is whether his five games this year amount to a case for retention.
Auld said: "That was a one-off and I wouldn't have thought we're in a position to go back to the AFL and say, 'Can we do that again with Adam?' But the date for the promotion of rookies is a fair way off and that decision wouldn't be dealt with, I wouldn't think, until the new coach can get involved."
It also seems likely that Essendon assistant coach Dean Wallis will be leaving Windy Hill, in all likelihood to join his close friend Mark Harvey, who is expected to be appointed full-time coach of Fremantle later this week or early next week.
"I have had a chat to Dean and at this stage, he has not held any formal discussions with Mark or Fremantle. But having said that, until we appoint a senior coach, we're not in a position to make any decisions on assistant coaches and we understand that one or two of our coaches may find other roles in the meantime."
THE appointment of Kevin Sheedy's successor as Essendon coach may not be made until after trade week, with the Dons confirming yesterday that they are prepared to negotiate their way through the October 8-12 window without a senior coach.
With an admission that is certain to be interpreted as further evidence of the club's intention to lure either Mark Williams from Port Adelaide or Mark Thompson from Geelong, Essendon's chief operating officer Travis Auld said there was "every possibility" that Sheedy's seat would still be cold in four weeks' time.
Auld, the head of the Essendon football department and a member of the coaching selection panel that interviewed West Coast assistant coach Peter Sumich yesterday, said the club did not want or need to compromise the search for Sheedy's replacement by setting a pre-trade deadline. Neale Daniher, Chris Bond, Guy McKenna, Matthew Knights and Damien Hardwick also have been interviewed for the job.
"There isn't any formal time line for the coach. It will take as long as it takes," Auld said.
"That's the way you want it to be. You wouldn't want to be hemmed in if it was going to take longer than that to get the right person. If it (the appointment) was made before the trade period, that would be ideal but there's every possibility we won't.
"That's not necessarily a problem, by the way. We have a list manager, Adrian Dodoro, who has been with the club for a long time. We've got a chairman of selectors (Kevin Egan). The only absence on the list committee at the moment is the head coach.
"So we'll take trade week as it comes. There are enough smart football people around the club at the moment to make those decisions in the short term and unless it was a major trade decision, I mean a seriously important deal, then they sort of speak for themselves. Not too many controversial trades go on these days. They're either quite obvious or they don't happen."
Should the appointment be as many as four weeks away, it also will mean that decisions on the careers of a handful of uncontracted players, among them Mark Johnson, Scott Camporeale, Mark Bolton, Chris Heffernan, Richard Cole and Adam Ramanauskas, also will be delayed.
"The first call on the list doesn't have to be made until October 31 and you would think we'll have a coach in place by then and he can have input into the calls that need to be made," Auld said.
"We have some players out of contract and there will be some uncertainty for them but unfortunately that's the game we're in."
A call on Ramanauskas' future may be the first big decision the new coach confronts. The 26-year-old premiership wingman's return to football this year after a series of battles with cancer was one of the feel-good football stories of the season but he returned, with special permission from the AFL Commission and the blessing of the 15 other clubs, as a mature-age rookie.
For next season, he must either be promoted back on to the senior list or delisted and the question that needs to be answered by the new coach is whether his five games this year amount to a case for retention.
Auld said: "That was a one-off and I wouldn't have thought we're in a position to go back to the AFL and say, 'Can we do that again with Adam?' But the date for the promotion of rookies is a fair way off and that decision wouldn't be dealt with, I wouldn't think, until the new coach can get involved."
It also seems likely that Essendon assistant coach Dean Wallis will be leaving Windy Hill, in all likelihood to join his close friend Mark Harvey, who is expected to be appointed full-time coach of Fremantle later this week or early next week.
"I have had a chat to Dean and at this stage, he has not held any formal discussions with Mark or Fremantle. But having said that, until we appoint a senior coach, we're not in a position to make any decisions on assistant coaches and we understand that one or two of our coaches may find other roles in the meantime."
