Boss backs Suns search
PRESSURE is mounting on the coachless Gold Coast after their failed bid to lure Ken Hinkley, but AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan is backing the club to make the right call on the job.
The Suns’ search for a coach continues after Hinkley re-committed to Port Adelaide until 2021 this week.
The appointment looms as Suns boss Mark Evans’ most crucial call since he departed the AFL this year, given the club has missed finals every season from its foundation in 2011. McLachlan has backed Evans and the Suns’ process despite the club sounding out Hinkley, who was contracted for next year.
“What they couldn’t do was induce someone to breach a contract,” McLachlan told Fox Sports.
“Mark’s gone in there to do a job – to turn that club around. He’s made a decision with his board on the coach.
“Now his job is to look around and run a process and get the best coach. He’s obliged, I think, to make enquiries to management to see if there’s going to be a change of circumstances or to have a conversation.
“In the end, he’s (Hinkley) under contract, Port said go away ... and he moves on with his process.”
“Mark I know will do everything he needs to and will go through a thorough process.”
Rumours of Hinkley’s availability surfaced after reported discontent with outspoken Port Adelaide president David Koch, who questioned the commitment of some players after their elimination final loss to West Coast.
McLachlan backed Koch’s methods despite admitting he could have addressed the players differently.
“I’m sure, like us all, there are things he’d say he’d like to take back,” he said.
“Why he’s been so successful is because he’s been such a pusher, such a driver, so forceful. It’s only personalities like Kochie who are able to do things like he’s done at Port Adelaide, who will challenge the paradigms, who will be so pushy on the deals, on China.
“Look at where Port Adelaide were when he took over five years ago, and Ken came in. They were in a really bad way ... Now they’re a big, grown-up footy club and a big part of that’s David Koch.”