Breaking news this afternoon - Neil Craig has resigned as Adelaide coach effective immediately. Mark Bickley will take over as interim coach. Did Craigy jump or was he pushed??? No matter what has happened behind closed doors in the Adelaide boardroom, and despite several players coming out publicly backing him as coach, following the Crabs insipid performance on Friday night it was clear that his time was up. This announcement now throws up another interesting possibility - the future of Patrick Dangerfield!!! Danger, in an interview on 7 news last night declared that if Craig went he would seriously reconsider his future at the club!!! But now the Crabs might be able to hang onto Taylor Walker considering Craig was the man holding him back! Thoughts anyone?
I reckon Craig walked - couldn't do anything else and leave with his integrity intact. Dangerfield will stay My 2c
They should trade Dangermouse & Walker to the Saints Also ive done awesome job getting the Big Test Icicles off bottom of the ladder to now be a force, where do i send my resume!!
I am devastated. I wanted Gummy Bear to coach the Crows forever as they would never do anything while he was in charge. Now we have "Elbows" Bickely in charge. Who knows what he will bring to the table. Whoever, the new coach is next year will surely not want Craig anywhere around the place but apparently Trigg wants to keep him on the payroll (LOL) Dangerfield is now odds on to go back home to Victoria.
Which team could arrange a fair trade with the Crows for Dangerfield? Melbourne maybe as a 3way with Scully and GWS. If they get a first and third rounder perhaps they can find a trade out of their new found riches. Western Bulldogs would be another that could make a trade stick, and he would perfectly fit the team trade profile. They should have a relatively early first or second rounder that would be acceptable to the Crows. Not sure any other Melbourne team could satisfy the Crows in the draft no matter if he wants to go home or not.
Trigg is on the radio now stressing they will search "Nation Wide" to find the best possible replacement. So i don't think Goodwin will get the job so easily.
When you hear nationwide you can just expect that Bickley will get the job. Sounds like the "nationwide search" Essendon went through before appointing Bendigo Bombers coach Knights to replace Sheedy. Bickley to get the job long-term after a few morale boosting wins. Lock it in Eddie.
I reckon Simon Goodwin will stay at the Dons unless I've missed something? Don't think Goodwin will make it as a senior coach, or if he does, a good one, mainly because he'll just teach his players to Gamble and Bet.
I'd say at the moment Scott Burns & Nathan Bassett would be two leading candidates from outside the club. From within their current ranks of Assistants, there is also Ben Hart & Scott Camporeale (not sure if that's spelt correctly). Any other likely candidates from elsewhere?
Yeah, would've been better to have his llast game in the Showdown. Yet when he left, his mind was at the Club and probably still wanted them to do well, so giving over the Coaching Role means giving Bickley more experience on how to handle big games, and could be some extra experience for big games if he does well for the rest of the season and remains the coach.
The best coach in the AFL will be available next year, surely any team looking for a coach next year would be remiss to its members if they did not explore that option. In addition getting out of Melbourne may be the best thing for Malthouse.
It's still a big mystery on where Malthouse will be next year. To be honest I reckon he'll stay at the Pies or not coach at all, can't see him coaching any other club. If he was going for one, I don't think it would be Adelaide.
@ Soda_Bull Honestly cannot see Adelaide taking the huge risk of going for an untried Riccutio when they have 3 experienced assistants already there. I know Riccutio keeps saying he wouldn't mind giving coaching a crack sometime, but if he was really fair dinkum about it he'd get stuck into an apprenticeship as an assistant instead of shopping himself out to different country clubs making guest appearances as a player!!! They really need someone at the helm who has some experience at least as an assistant to develop the younger players. @ TiB This could be a blessing in disguise for Port in the Showdown - Bickley coming in now has to decide if he'll go with the flow & stick with the Craigy's game-plan which the players know & has resulted in insipid performances, or try to develop a new style of play that could actually bring some success. Whatever he does it won't happen overnight for him - plus with many players over the past couple of weeks going on public record supporting Craig as coach, the morale of the playing group will be at an all time low. Could be a big week for the Power mate