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Search for the Next Premiership Coach |
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Written by FootyGeek
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Jul 29, 2007 at 10:26 PM |
Several clubs are now on the lookout for their next premiership coach. Like in roulette, one can only wonder whose number will come up next. Now of course there are many factors that have to be taken into account when choosing who might be the best candidate. I decided to make life easier for those making the big decision and try to find out if one or two factors make any difference at all.
The process began by compiling a list of every VFL/AFL coach from 1980 onwards. Then all of the caretaker coaches were taken out so we were only left with those that clubs specifically chose in order to bring them greatness. Next a couple of criteria were placed on each coach; they are very simple, whether any of these coaches were at one stage captain of a VFL/AFL club or if they were ever a member of a VFL/AFL premiership team. Then they were split up according to these criteria and the results are below.
Firstly, lets look at all the coaches from 1980 who neither captained a VFL/AFL or played in a VFL/AFL premiership. The table is below. As you can see it is an eclectic bunch, the number down the bottom gives the premiership strike-rate which is basically the percentage who won a premiership as coach out of all the coaches in this category. As you can see the strike-rate is 17% including some legendary names in Jeans and Hafey, some would say the right person at the right time in Joyce and the career coach in Pagan. I know there are some interstate people here who played many games for SA and WA leagues but only VFL/AFL matches are counted for the purposes of this study. There are also a lot of 'experiments' in this list, most of which failed.
The next category is those who never captained a VFL/AFL club but did play in a premiership team. The strike-rate here is only 11%. Tony Jewel and Mick Malthouse are the only people in this category to manage a premiership. This list is very interesting because it contains quite a few 'nice' guys whose reputations were not exactly fierce on the field (apart from Neil Balme of course).
The next list is those coaches who captained a VFL/AFL club but never played in a premiership side. A rather small list but a rather impressive strike rate of 38%. Before the last three years the strike-rate would have been at only 12%, but luckily for this category Mark Williams and Paul Roos have gone in to bat for the captains without premiership medals.
The final category is those coaches who both captained a VFL/AFL team and also played in VFL/AFL premiership/s as a player. A much larger list indicating these types are more prized and chosen more often. This is with good reason apparently, because the strike-rate is at 38% for premiership coaches in this category. However, there is another factor that should be taken into account.
Often club legends who are past captains and premiership players for a particular club are given the job of coach of the club where they made those achievements. More often than not this had not worked out. In the list above 8 have failed and 2 have succeeded. If we take those coaches out of the table we get the table below. There you have it; coaches who are captains and premiership players who have coached firstly at a different club have a 50% strike-rate of premiership success!
Out of the five who did not get there two of them got to a grand final as coach and one (Mark Thompson) looks very likely to join the other six and make the strike-rate 60%! If you told any supporter that a given coach would have a 60% chance of getting a premiership for your team they would take it every time.
Of course these factors are not the be all and end all of coaching prowess, but I would suggest that the data shown would make pretty interesting reading for any of the four clubs now vying for their next coach. Good luck! |
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Last Updated ( Jan 29, 2010 at 08:44 AM )
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