Phoenix already weighing options

Contenders emerge as club hopes to fill Merrick’s coaching job before Christmas

Ernie Merrick's seat is still warm, but already the contenders to replace him are circling. The Wellington Phoenix football coach only resigned late on Sunday night, but according to chairman Rob Morrison, the CVs started to flood in to general manager David Dome's inbox almost immediately.

“Obviously we'll discard some of those and we'll look at some of them,” said Morrison. “We've got a bit of an idea as to what we think we need. We've drawn up a little shortlist.”

When Merrick was hired in 2013, the recruitment panel had the luxury of an entire off-season to conduct a thorough process. By contrast, time is now of the essence.

“It's a very compressed time-frame, but we certainly want to make the decision before Christmas,” said Morrison.

“We went through a pretty rigorous sort of process three years ago when we hired Ernie. That worked for us; Ernie was the right choice. In a much, much shorter timeframe, we'll run a similar process.”

“Obviously it's possible that we could make a decision before Christmas but the coach can't arrive until after Christmas and we'd understand that. But we're in-season, things are moving, we've got a really good team, we've got a lot of potential and we want to get it unlocked as quickly as possible so the onus is on us to make a quick decision.”

Early favourites for the job include successful Auckland City coach Ramon Tribulietx and former Sydney FC captain and ex-Sydney United

We went through a pretty rigorous sort of process three years ago when we hired Ernie. That worked for us; Ernie was the right choice. Rob Morrison

coach Mark Rudan. Former Phoenix assistant coach Luciano Trani has also confirmed he has applied for the position.

But Morrison indicated that coaching ability was just one part of the recruitment puzzle.

“You obviously want a quality coach, but you also want someone (for who) it's not about them; it's about the club,” he said.

“The way we've tried to build and develop this club is that no-one is more important than the club. There are far too many football clubs – and some other sports clubs – where it's all about the coach. We don't want that. We want a coach who understands what the club is trying to achieve and wants to align themselves with the success of the club.”

Merrick's assistants, Chris Greenacre and Des Buckingham, will guide the team in Saturday's clash with the Central Coast Mariners in Hamilton and probably the game against Western Sydney the following weekend. Neither has indicated whether they are interested in the job.