The AFL's top 10 worst coaches

[Farrand]

Neesham is under rated - shouldnt have been let near recruiting but a lot of what he did changed the game of footy.

Would have been interesting to see what he could have done with a decent list.

Good to see someone praise Neesham. He definitely wasn't the worst by far with a great record with Claremont and making Freo competitive in our first year through major disruption and poor recruiting.

He implemented a brand of football that was ahead of it's time and the chip and draw is basically used today. With better recruitment Freo could have been a very dangerous side.

Damian Drum on the other hand. I'll give him that he got our first ever Derby win but I will give nothing else. Horrendous.

In terms of the worst I've ever seen; Balme, Drum, Judge (who had the honour and ruining two teams).

 

[Hank Scorpion]

Brad Scott

10 seasons in charge, and hasn't done any better than getting blown away in 2 PFs. 3rd longest serving coach without a GF appearance.

Not as terrible on game day as some of the others mentioned here, but he's been given more time in a job than some much better coaches.

 

[gingernuts]

remove Hinkley from the list

 

[Captain_Bender]

remove Hinkley from the list

Unless Port Adelaide lose next week then he is back on isn't that how it works

 

[____]

Can't believe Leppa hasn't got a mention

 

[Superstar swan]

Longmire

 

[H2F]

1. Dom Pyke

Adelaide are the only team I can see that have made zero adaption to the 6/6/6 rule.

You can’t play two tall forwards and win.

You must have the run and carry attack seemingly taken away by the rule. You must have massive rebound and run power. They have nothing out of defence and have made no changes. Even worse their only player like this Gibbs was dropped

You can’t play tall forwards who don’t play deep. You can’t even really play two so far as we’ve seen. Yet Jenkins plays and their structure is set to fail

It’s a rule change that requires run for four quarters and massive effort and they have none of it.

This guy is a massive example of poster listed failure as a coach. No sense of the rules, no sense of how to enable your players to succeed.


Worst coach I have ever seen, other than maybe Eade at Gold Coast.

 

[deck]

1. Dom Pyke

Adelaide are the only team I can see that have made zero adaption to the 6/6/6 rule.

You can’t play two tall forwards and win.

Really? Both Grand Final teams played 2 tall forwards last year. I'm guessing you have a different criteria on what constitutes a tall forward because only Richmond who I can think of the top teams played with 1 but are now playing 2.

 

[north_lad]

1 - 10. Brad Scott

 

[Mikey13G]

Ken Hinkley. Port has underachieved for the past 5 years thanks to that fat, bald headed, coke zero drinking wombat.

 

[NonPhixion]

Mick Malthouse, Carlton edition, needs to be mentioned here. No-one has destroyed a club as entirely in my lifetime.

Took over a young, developing team with a mandate to 'put them over the top'. A team that played fast, exciting football, had a host of young stars just entering their primes, and where the sky was the limit. When he left, the team was last placed, and needing a '3 year rebuild' to recover from the damage.

He had a forward line based around fast, quick small forwards who applied defensive pressure (Betts, Garlett, Armfield, Robinson) and mobile bigs (Waite,
Walker). He instituted a game play based around kicking long and slow around the boundary line to contests and moved Walker into defence. By the time he finished, Betts, Garlett, Waite and Robinson had left the club.

He had a backline with versatile, athletic but undersized players who were best at zoning and reading the play (eg: Henderson, Thornton, Laidler, Bower, Watson) and fast, running defenders who rebounded (Yarran, Touhy). Played strict man to man defence, with no zoning allowed. He insisted on playing Henderson forward. By the time he finished, Henderson, Yarran, Russell and Laidler had left the club, and the rest of the young defence was gone from the league, confidence shot.

He had a midfield entering its prime: Judd, Simpson, Carazzo, Murphy, Gibbs, all aged 22-27 when he took over the team, plus solid pieces around them also in the 22-27 age bracket (McLean, Bell, Curnow, Russell). By the time he finished, McLean, Bell, Curnow, Carazzo and Judd had finished their careers, and the primes of the rest were squandered.

Honestly, if he'd been a plant by Eddie McGuire to destroy Carlton once and for all, I wouldn't be surprised.

This lol. I always remember that Round 5 game in 2015 where there was a massive build-up for Malthouse breaking the coaching games record, ironically against Collingwood and the players dished out zero effort, was evident at that point he had completely lost them.

 

[TheGeneralmeg]

Can't believe Leppa hasn't got a mention

Is that you Zac OBrien

 

[00Stinger]

To his credit, Neeld had a fairly awful bunch of players with which to work

to an extent.

The team won 9 & 1/2 games the year before.

If you take out a GWS team full of 18 year olds, he won 1 game in 33. And to be honest that was a bloody lucky win too

 

[Ok Boomer]

K Judge and M Neeld by a mile.

 

[wagstaff]

Peter Rhode not getting enough mentions. Somehow took a side that had top-end talent like Grant, Darcy, Johnson, Smith and West and could only manage 8 wins across two seasons plus a wooden spoon. And this was a side that otherwise never had less than 9 wins in a season that decade and played finals four times.

 

[Crusty Demon]

What about Tim Watson? Saints finished top of the ladder in 97 and lost to Adelaide in the GF. In 98 they made the Semi Finals and had Robert Harvey win the Brownlow medal. They sack Stan Alves and Watson took over in 99 with players such as Harvey, Burke, Hayes, Everitt, Hall, Loewe, Wakelins, Aussie Jones etc and finished 10th. 2000 they could only muster up 2 wins and finished dead last. They were 0-10 that season. Lasted 2 long seasons and took them from a solid finals team when he took over to dead last with just 2 wins with a very similar playing list.

 

[Upgrayedd]

Mick Malthouse, Carlton edition, needs to be mentioned here. No-one has destroyed a club as entirely in my lifetime.

Took over a young, developing team with a mandate to 'put them over the top'. A team that played fast, exciting football, had a host of young stars just entering their primes, and where the sky was the limit. When he left, the team was last placed, and needing a '3 year rebuild' to recover from the damage.

He had a forward line based around fast, quick small forwards who applied defensive pressure (Betts, Garlett, Armfield, Robinson) and mobile bigs (Waite,
Walker). He instituted a game play based around kicking long and slow around the boundary line to contests and moved Walker into defence. By the time he finished, Betts, Garlett, Waite and Robinson had left the club.

He had a backline with versatile, athletic but undersized players who were best at zoning and reading the play (eg: Henderson, Thornton, Laidler, Bower, Watson) and fast, running defenders who rebounded (Yarran, Touhy). Played strict man to man defence, with no zoning allowed. He insisted on playing Henderson forward. By the time he finished, Henderson, Yarran, Russell and Laidler had left the club, and the rest of the young defence was gone from the league, confidence shot.

He had a midfield entering its prime: Judd, Simpson, Carazzo, Murphy, Gibbs, all aged 22-27 when he took over the team, plus solid pieces around them also in the 22-27 age bracket (McLean, Bell, Curnow, Russell). By the time he finished, McLean, Bell, Curnow, Carazzo and Judd had finished their careers, and the primes of the rest were squandered.

Honestly, if he'd been a plant by Eddie McGuire to destroy Carlton once and for all, I wouldn't be surprised.

This is a man who knows the pinpoint moment his team went from middle of the road, where you bring someone in with passion, dedication and knows where the football club needs to go, Or just hire the big name, Question nothing and let him burn the house down

What he did at Carlton was horrific, As you said. Maybe the defense needed some work, Maybe lacked just a true Big forward. However they broke hard, Spread well and blitzed teams. Within 3 months he had a quick athletic fleet footed side playing slow possession football, Failed so he started just making wholesale cuts to the list.

Malthouses last 3 years in AFL he damaged carlton just as bad as the salary cap cheating. They are still suffering as well with just a lack of that age bracket of 28-33

People will whinge about Bolton now, Look at the age of the side they had out, Murphy in the rooms by 20M in, Kreuzer is about 30? And just cant stay on the park. Next oldest player was Ed Curnow who no disrespect only has gotten so far by playing at a s**t carlton sider then It's Nic Newman at 26. They are just in dire need of a couple of older players to slot in. But Malthouse's cull means that there isnt much left

 

[sobrave]

James Hird almost got his club booted out of the competition. Wins this by a landslide

 

[Topkent]

This is a man who knows the pinpoint moment his team went from middle of the road, where you bring someone in with passion, dedication and knows where the football club needs to go, Or just hire the big name, Question nothing and let him burn the house down

What he did at Carlton was horrific, As you said. Maybe the defense needed some work, Maybe lacked just a true Big forward. However they broke hard, Spread well and blitzed teams. Within 3 months he had a quick athletic fleet footed side playing slow possession football, Failed so he started just making wholesale cuts to the list.

Malthouses last 3 years in AFL he damaged carlton just as bad as the salary cap cheating. They are still suffering as well with just a lack of that age bracket of 28-33

People will whinge about Bolton now, Look at the age of the side they had out, Murphy in the rooms by 20M in, Kreuzer is about 30? And just cant stay on the park. Next oldest player was Ed Curnow who no disrespect only has gotten so far by playing at a **** carlton sider then It's Nic Newman at 26. They are just in dire need of a couple of older players to slot in. But Malthouse's cull means that there isnt much left

Same situation happened at Melbourne except we traded in senior players. I know some people will point to where we are this season but id take this every day over a Neeld team.

Hibberd, May, Kolo, Garlett, Lewis, Frost Melksham traded in an then Vandenburg, Hannan, Hore, Fritsch, Lockhart brought in from the state leagues. Its why we have gone around 50-50 In Goodys 3 years

 

[Johnny_Dogg4]

peter rohde

 

[Upgrayedd]

Same situation happened at Melbourne except we traded in senior players. I know some people will point to where we are this season but id take this every day over a Neeld team.

Hibberd, May, Kolo, Garlett, Lewis, Frost Melksham traded in an then Vandenburg, Hannan, Hore, Fritsch, Lockhart brought in from the state leagues. Its why we have gone around 50-50 In Goodys 3 years

Exactly. ALl well and good to bring in young players and refresh the list. You however can't do that by making wholesale cuts of 40% of your list in 2-3 years or else your are exposing players to thumpings and not letting them grow under players. Melbourne took a long way back by recruiting guys who may not have been wanted by 4/5 clubs by Roo's wanted experienced players with a bit of leadership to help the younger guys find their feet and way.

 

[Fabab]

Malthouse at Carlton.

 

[nineteen eighty]

Exactly. ALl well and good to bring in young players and refresh the list. You however can't do that by making wholesale cuts of 40% of your list in 2-3 years or else your are exposing players to thumpings and not letting them grow under players. Melbourne took a long way back by recruiting guys who may not have been wanted by 4/5 clubs by Roo's wanted experienced players with a bit of leadership to help the younger guys find their feet and way.

I believe you can make drastic cuts to ones list. However, it needs to be supplemented with mature players to play alongside the kids. This is not about the Tiges so please don’t bash me about being another Tiger propagandist but the Tiges completely overhauled their list when Dimma joined. They brought in a lot of kids and some mature players. Those mature players became critical role players for us...Grigg & Houli to name a couple.

Coaching is a key component when overhauling a list. It’s why I defended Dimma right throughout his tenure. Any other coach would not have had the “success” he had playing finals in those early years with such an overhaul of the list. Question is...can Bolton be a good senior coach? I have no doubt he is an excellent assistant. As Rohde was. As Neeld was. As Scotty Watters was etc.

 

[NonPhixion]

As a Collingwood supporter I loved what he did. But Malthouse pretty much destroyed Carlton, brought them to absolute rock bottom

 

[marty36]

Hird has to take this one out, he single handed almost destroyed an entire club

Our worst was Robert Shaw