Perception can be stronger than reality in all manner of pursuits and Australian football is undoubtedly susceptible to myth-making.
The replacement of two senior coaches in two weeks – North Melbourne’s Brad Scott and Carlton’s Brendon Bolton by caretakers in Rhyce Shaw and David Teague respectively – was always going to see the phrase “new coach spike” given a fair workout.
And so it has proved, neither stand-in yet to taste defeat, Shaw having led the Roos to victories over Richmond and Gold Coast, and Teague in charge with the Blues when they pulled back a six-goal deficit to beat Brisbane last Saturday.
How often does a tumultuous week at an AFL club culminating in a senior coach’s departure proceed a vastly-improved on-field performance the following weekend with a new man sitting in the box?
Well, not that often, as it turns out.
There’s long been an assumption a new coach at the helm seems to precede a sudden improvement in a team’s fortunes, if not over a longer period at least in that first releasing of the pressure valve. But it just ain’t the case.
Since 2000, prior to Shaw and Teague and not including one-offs where a coach took ill for a week or few, there’s been 22 occasions on which a senior coach was replaced mid-season. His caretaker replacement has managed a first-up win just eight times. That’s a strike rate of 36.4 per cent, or a little over one-third.
So the instant fix of the “new coach spike” is more of an urban myth.
And the longer term? You’d expect the win-loss ratio across the rest of the season to be lower as the novelty wears off. And yes, that’s the case, too. Caretaker coaches since 2000 have presided over 149 games. They’ve won 52, lost 94 and drawn three. That’s a win percentage of just 34.9.
What’s interesting, though, when it comes to Shaw and Teague’s prospects of hanging on to the seats they currently occupy, is what’s happened to the caretakers who have been able to summon something of an improvement in their team’s performances.
The three standouts in win-loss terms have been Paul Roos, who went 6-4 after taking over at Sydney mid-season in 2002 following the sacking of Rodney Eade; Matthew Primus, who led Port Adelaide to five wins in seven games after the departure of Mark Williams in 2010, and Scott Camporeale.
Indeed, the latter’s performance in charge of Adelaide after the tragic death of Phil Walsh in 2015 was nothing short of extraordinary. In almost unbelievable circumstances, he took the Crows to seven wins in their last 11 games, including an elimination final on the road against the Western Bulldogs.
After being a reluctant starter for other senior jobs since Adelaide turned to Don Pyke for the following season, Camporeale appears to be a willing contender for the Carlton job for 2020. And given clubs’ continued fondness for “favourite sons”, the link is obvious to the former Blues’ wingman, who played 233 games and was part of the 1995 premiership side.
And just outside the window of 2000 onwards is statistically the most successful fill-in of all, Jeff Gieschen, who took over Richmond in 1997 after Robert Walls’s sacking and led the Tigers to four wins from five.
A common denominator? It’s that Gieschen, Roos and Primus all went on to take over the coaching jobs of their clubs full-time. And how did that pan out? History would suggest a scorecard of one from three.
Roos famously inherited the Sydney job on the back of “people power”. Already a popular figure having finished his playing career with the Swans then becoming an assistant to Eade, such was the public clamouring for Roos as coach it eventually helped steer the club away from Terry Wallace, who the Swans had all but officially appointed.
Seven finals campaigns from eight full seasons, two grand final appearances and the famous breaking of a 72-year premiership drought by the Swans in 2005 would suggest it was an inspired move.
The same tale, sadly, can’t be told for Gieschen or Primus. The former was wound up after two full seasons at the helm, Wallace his replacement, though it should be noted Gieschen did maintain a positive win-loss ratio. Primus was moved on by Port late in the 2012 season with a strike rate of only 27 per cent.
Perhaps the case of Primus goes some way to explaining the reluctance of clubs since his tenure to stay with a caretaker once the immediate instability (and season) has been negotiated.
From 2000 until Primus’s stint at Port Adelaide, there were five coaches who stayed in the hot seat on a permanent basis (Primus, Roos, Grant Thomas at St Kilda, Mark Harvey at Fremantle and Brett Ratten at Carlton).
Since his departure, 11 men have filled in after a mid-season departure. None have continued in the role the following season.
Coaching trends being what they are, you can almost now imagine an over-correction by North Melbourne and Carlton at the end of this season should Shaw and Teague continue their winning ways, perhaps looking for reasons not to continue their tenures.
Certainly neither has the sort of stature in the game Roos enjoyed that is likely to mount a significant public push for their retention in those respective coaching gigs. That would make moving on to other candidates a lot easier.
Then again, it’s not as though obvious suitors, apart perhaps from now former North coach Scott are falling from the trees these days. Roos isn’t interested in saddling up again as the front man.
And if Teague particularly can clock up a few more wins to add to last Saturday’s, given Carlton had won only four of its previous 43 games under Bolton, you suspect Blues fans might be a lot more enthusiastic about the prospect, remembering he’s also pulled on a Carlton jumper as a player.
The more North Melbourne and Carlton keep winning, the more we’re going to see prevailing orthodoxies tested. And whether, when it comes to coaching appointments, the temporary reversal of a losing trend plus the advantage of incumbency proves too tempting a proposition for the clubs in question to ignore.
Rohan Connolly is one of Australia's foremost sportswriters – a veteran of both broadcast and print media. In the era of sanitised corporate sports media his is a perspective worth exploring. You can read more of Rohan's work at FOOTYOLOGY.
