He’s a great assistant coach, and we have one of the worst coaching panels in the league. He was a forwards and midfield coach at Hawthorn, during their three-peat.
So he was in charge of a good forward line 4? 5? years ago.
Still better than what we have currently
Rob Harding
Performance Coach - Opposition and Team Offence
https://www.essendonfc.com.au/teams/profiles/coaches
Anyone else notice that Rob Harding now has a title which includes the responsibility for Team Offence?
How new is this?
When they first re did the photos and blurbs this year Harding’s responsibilities were:
“In 2019, Harding will once again play a key role in formulating Essendon’s game-day strategy and opposition analysis”
The original role sounds coherent and specific to individual game strategy. The new title implies he is a full on assistant with the title “performance” coach and drills in the consistent Team Offence part of the game plan.
Where Rutten is “Team Defence and Key Position Coach”
So it sounds like the game plan is divided up between Rutten and Harding.
Is there any chance our key position forwards are a little confused with having.
- Woosha as overall coach
- Paul Corrigan as their forwards coach
- Ben Rutten as their Key Position and team defence coach
- Rob Harding as their team offence coach
When you combine this with the fact that our KPF’s have had almost zero continuity, and who do they include?
- Joe
, - Smack ,
- Stewart ? 3rd tall ?KPF,
- Brown ?3rd tall ?KPF,
- Stringer ?3rd tall ?KPF,
- Hooker KPD , ?KPF,
- Zac Clarke ?KPF,
- Francis ?KPF,
- Ambrose ?KPF,
- Laverde ?KPF,
- Langford ?KPF,
- Walla CHF ,
- Bellchambers ?KPF.
- and they would have also been looking at Draper to fill a KPF role at times as he bordered on senior selection.
I wish I was joking about Walla, but he is the only one to be able to get in the right position to contest in the forward line more often than not.
Where we have a tight back 6 of: Hurley, Hooker, Ambrose, Saad, McKenna and Redman - who have conceded the least points in the league since Redman joined them in round 4.
We have had a dozen players play predominantly forward already this year, not to mention the midfielders having stints there during the game.
I would argue that there is definitely an inconsistency of personnel causing our forward incoherence and given there are 3 assistant coaches who are trying to implement sometimes contradictory messages in the forward line, and the main forward coach being the least experienced is likely having difficulty in making the message a coherent one.
We really need someone who can get a coherent message across on what our forward strategy is.
Carracella would be the obvious choice to my mind for 2020, with a view to taking over the senior role in 2021.
Looking at Richmond’s coaching structure for 2019, it looks like we would be better off replacing Harding’s Team Offence role with Carracella, to re-unite him with Rutten in complementary roles.
Richmond 2019 coaching structure:
Senior coach: Damien Hardwick
Head of Coaching and Football Performance: Tim Livingstone
Assistant coach, forwards: Andrew McQualter
Assistant coach, midfield/stoppage: Adam Kingsley
Assistant coach, backline: Justin Leppitsch
Assistant coach, offensive: Blake Caracella
VFL and development coach (forwards): Craig McRae
Development coach and VFL midfield: Xavier Clarke
Development coach and VFL backline: Ryan Ferguson
Interestingly Geelong have a fairly simple coaching structure which makes ours look cumbersome:
Geelong 2019 coaching structure:
Chris Scott - Senior coach
James Rahilly - Assistant coach (forwards)
Matthew Knights - Assistant coach (midfield)
Matthew Scarlett - Assistant coach (backline)
Nigel Lappin - Assistant coach
Corey Enright - Development coach
Shane O’Bree - VFL Coach
1 Like
Fairly simple how they call it, doesn’t mean that it fully sits that way. Just as ours might seem confusing, it is also possible that in reality it is simple. Titles don’t really do it for me, just as at my work they are changing the titles of all the bosses, they are still doing the same job.
2 Likes
Stringer on Footy Classified: (Woosha) and Skippy one of the reasons he came to the club.
6 Likes
Yep.
I honestly don’t understand the hate he gets on here, I think half of it stems from his 2009 year playing with us.
Every coach we’ve had whether Knights, Hird, Bomber or Worsfold has kept him and everyone at the club has had nothing but praise for him publicly the past 10 years.
13 Likes
Completely agree. As a footballer nobody could fault his attitude or endeavour; he just wasn’t quite fast enough or strong enough to make it at senior level.
As for the vacancies, the one I would move Heaven and Earth to get is Hodge, assuming he hangs up the boots. He’s got senior coach written all over him and he plays the game very tough but not dirty, and he knows how to win and how to lead.
2 Likes
Hodge has already come out and said he will 100% be at the Lions next year as either a coach or a player.
Roughhead, Morris, McVeigh, Burgoyne are the other guys we could be targetting.
They should have just left Skipworth as the forward coach, where he was in 2017 when it was working well (albeit the forward group had continuity). It’s a personal pet peeve when assistant coaches are shifted between roles continually
3 Likes
McVeigh is one I would be targeting. Great Leader at the swans.
You almost convinced me until the “ not dirty” bit, where Hepps face would beg to differ.
1 Like
It happens because they are generally all coaches in training and want to move around to also develop broader skillsets. It is why a lot of them move clubs as regularly as they do.
4 Likes
wot
2 Likes
Has he gone back just quietly?
Jake arrived in 2018 and said (FC quoted in the Age) :
"Essendon’s five-match winning streak has eased the pressure on coach John Worsfold, and Stringer touched on the coach’s impact in being able to get the best out of he and his teammates.
“He and [forwards coach] Hayden Skipworth, they just instilled the belief in me that I can get back to being the player I know I can be,” he said."
Or when Jake said his line coach was Skipworth (on Footy Classified) did he mean mid?
Plus from Skips’ interview he said how the line coaches all have to talk with each other to ensure there is clear understanding between the different groups. No doubt there would be a lot of shared input across the lines. And then the specific line coach will be responsible for implementation.
From the recent “Inside the Play” on EFC, it sounded like Corrigan was still in charge of the forward group.
I understand that they like to move around to broaden their skillset but, from memory, Skipworth was only forward coach for a year or two (one of which would have been 2016). He also has seems to have a strong relationship with a number of our forwards; Stringer and Joe in particular.
I guess I would prefer for team performance to be prioritised over the development of the assistants, especially when they have performed well in that role. Specialisation via extended periods in a set role may actually be better for their development as coaches.
The is AFL trending towards specialist coordinators for team offence and team defence - on top of the line coaches. Skipworth looks to be developing a CV to become an offensive coordinator, having been exposed to both the forward and midfield groups, but he is only 36 and imo should have been left as the forward coach to give the young group we had in their more continuity.
Stringer trains with midfield group generally
3 Likes
is it correct that Paul Corrigan and Dan Jordan contracts have not been renewed and they are off at the end of the season.
Corrigan yes. And Harding leaving.
Not Jordan that I’m aware of.
4 Likes