Blight: Coaching cuts a ‘reality check’ for clubs
Walker OK after big AFL fall
AFL:
Football great Malcolm Blight is hopeful leaner coaching panels and a purer form of the game will emerge after the financial firestorm sparked by the coronavirus shutdown passes.
The AFL and its 18 clubs have stood down about 80 per cent of their workforce in anticipation of a fall in revenue of up to $1 billion this year caused by the suspension of the premiership season.
Blight, who coached Adelaide to flags in 1997 and 1998, believes clubs will have no choice but to slash coaching budgets even after some level of normality returns.
“I think the amount of money being wasted inside football clubs, particularly in coaching departments, has been excessive,” Blight told SEN radio yesterday.
“I’ve thought it for years, I’ve said it for years.
“I hate people losing their jobs but this is going to be a reality check for everybody.”
Blight used the infamous footage of an Essendon coaching box from last season that was crammed with people and laptops to illustrate his point.
“It’s just illogical and impractical and for the football world to get away with it, I’ve been mystified for years by it,” he said. “I hope it does change and that way we might get a pure game back. It’s a players’ game, let the players play.
“We should be trying to help them through the little hiccups, not trying to invent the hiccups.”
Jason Phelan
AFL:
North Melbourne recruit Josh Walker admits he is “lucky” to have been cleared of any serious damage after a horrific fall during round one of the AFL season.
Walker flew for a mark over St Kilda’s Tim Membrey and landed awkwardly on his back and neck in an incident that Kangaroos coach Rhyce Shaw later admitted had caused some nervous moments in the box.
Walker’s parents and partner were on hand in an otherwise empty stadium to witness the key-position player’s first appearance for North Melbourne after time with both Geelong and Brisbane.
But they only saw Walker on the field for about 15 minutes before the incident saw him ruled out for the rest of the match.
Walker passed all the relevant medical tests on Monday and said the only lasting impact was a stiff neck.
“In reality I’ve come out with pretty much nothing so it could’ve been a lot worse,” Walker said.
“I suppose it’s a pretty vulnerable position and you could end up with a decent knockout or a broken neck or something, so I am lucky.”
Walker said he would have been fit to play against his former club Brisbane in round two for the first time since moving to the Kangaroos if the AFL had not been suspended because of the coronavirus.