JUST as the St Kilda Football Club last year chose to sack its coach purely to land a specific target, the Gold Coast Suns on Monday night, after a board meeting, began their draft of that playbook.
Out Brett Ratten, in Ross Lyon at the Saints. At the Suns, Stuart Dew out as the first step in a plan to secure three-time premiership coach Damien Hardwick.
Perennially struggling football clubs like the Saints, who boast one premiership in 127 years in the VFL/AFL, and the Suns, who haven't been able to get near the finals in 12 seasons in the AFL, often treat once-valued people appallingly as they panic and attempt to navigate paths out of mediocrity.
I have no problems with the decisions of the Suns and Saints to forcibly exit Dew and Ratten, as their coaching carried many question marks. But I do have major issues with the boards, and specifically the chairs, of these clubs doing so within months of re-contracting those men. If the coaches have been held to ultimate account, so too should the people making the calls on the coaches.
Bob East is an inaugural Suns director who took over from Tony Cochrane as chairman in March. East has been there from the Suns' AFL entry, a period that takes in Guy McKenna's coaching in 2011-14 before his sacking, Rodney Eade's identification as McKenna's replacement and subsequent sacking in 2017, and Dew's appointment post-Eade. East was also, obviously, on the Suns board when, 53 weeks ago, it re-contacted Dew through to the end of 2024.
Dew was sacked 16 matches into that new deal. Ratten didn't get to coach even one match of his new contract. And both clubs get to benefit from needing to pay just six months of severance pay. It is wrong that this industry allows for those often most stressed within it to be treated so poorly financially when club boards retreat from previous promises. Surely the AFL Coaches Association could seek to stand for something on this.
Watching and listening to East on Tuesday attempt to explain the reasoning behind Dew's sacking was at times a bizarre exercise.
"I want to make it absolutely crystal clear that we are unashamedly holding this club to account at a very high level," East said.
Strong phrasing. Absolutely crystal clear, unashamedly. Wonder if East is going to subject himself, his board and all aspects of his administration to the same filters. History would suggest no, he won't, and the coach sacking will be the only jolt to operations. It's always the coaches causing the most problems at these clubs.
The Saints certainly felt so. Simon Lethlean oversaw St Kilda's football department while Ratten was coach. Lethlean was elevated to the CEO role last year, and almost instantly announced a review into ... the club's football department. Out: Ratten.
At least St Kilda didn't bother with a process to replace Ratten. The main reason it sacked him was because it wanted Lyon. And it kept upping the dollars until he signed.
The Hardwick camp is well aware of what happens now that Dew has been formally removed from Suns' operations, and is eagerly awaiting formal details of informal speculation.
East said Suns chief executive Mark Evans, who last week attempted to dismiss media speculation of Dew's imminent sacking, would "bring thoughts back to the board" on processes around appointing the club's next coach.
"This (Dew's sacking) has now allowed us to have some clear air to look at next steps, and that's a really important part of governance in any business to ensure that we set about a good process, a good system, good governance around the selection of our next senior coach," East said.
More words. Governance. Process. System.
Gold Coast has been prepared in the past to talk tough, privately and publicly, when many players have chosen to leave. Tom Lynch copped an almighty spray from Touk Miller when it was revealed he was likely to leave at the end of 2018, having given the club very good service for eight full seasons.
And as of Monday night, the club has now chosen to off-load someone who, as recently as 12 months ago, had been identified by the board as the right person to coach until the end of 2024.
Once again, a group of people at a poorly performed AFL club who were once all-in on a coach, or coaches, get to sack those coaches, and then immediately empower themselves with finding the next one.
Rinse, repeat.
