Suns board wants major team review
GOLD Coast have lost patience with their underperforming side and have ordered a comprehensive review into the entire football program that could sound the death knell for coach Rodney Eade.
A season that begun with high hopes for the club has deteriorated into another wasted year of inconsistent effort and weak surrenders and out-of-contract Eade is now at long odds to receive a new deal.
The last time the Suns conducted a major review into former coach Guy McKenna it was conducted by football manager Marcus Ashcroft.
However this time chief exectuive officer Mark Evans has been handed the responsibility and the positions of Ashcroft and list manager Scott Clayton will also be assessed.
Every Suns assistant coach is also out of contract which could mean wholesale changes are looming.
Suns chairman Tony Cochrane said the board needed to know if it had the right personnel in key positions to take the side to the finals.
He said the calls for a review were not a knee-jerk reaction to the Suns’ 67-point loss to the Swans in Sydney on Saturday.
“At our last board meeting the board instructed Mark Evans to undertake a wide-ranging assessment of our football program,’’ Cochrane said.
“With his experience and expertise there is no person better placed to assess out entire program than Mark.
“We need to make sure we are doing everything we possibly can to improve year on year, that’s what our members expect.’’
The Suns play Collingwood at Metricon Stadium this weekend in a match that pits the two coaches under the most pressure in the competition against each other.
Collingwood’s Nathan Buckley has already started to concede his future is bleak, saying the Pies’ loss to Essendon on Saturday was a “tipping point” and the first time he had noticed they had “lost hope.”