Leigh's lion pride now in coaches box

The Brisbane Lions have celebrated the 10th anniversary of their triple Premiership success.

Coach Leigh Matthews talks to his Brisbane Lions during a quarter-time break at the Gabba. Picture: Darren England. Source: The Courier-Mail

GREAT AFL teams produce a glut of good coaches.

The Brisbane Lions side that captured a hat-trick of flags from 2001-2003 is no different and yesterday's Three-Peat Anniversary Lunch could have doubled as an AFL Coaches' Association meeting.

Twenty-seven players from the 28 men who took Brisbane to three straight premierships were feted by a 1200-strong crowd at the Brisbane Convention Centre, where memories of the historic charge filled the giant room.

Brisbane Lions 2013 season preview

Getting so many of the former players in the same room at the same time was a feat in itself, given many have spread far and wide to pursue coaching careers in the AFL which starts its season tonight when Adelaide take on Essendon.

Geelong premiership coach and two-time Lions premiership defender Chris Scott said it was no surprise the Brisbane side had produced so many coaches given Leigh Matthews was in charge.

"Yeah, absolutely," Scott said when asked if there was a high football IQ among the Brisbane squad that lended itself to coaching.

"It was probably even more acute given Leigh Matthews was coaching us.

Last-minute SuperCoach cheat sheet

"It makes sense that more than a few of us have gone on with it.

"But I don't think any of us were thinking about pursuing a coaching career at the time."

Jason Akermanis, who will coach in regional Victoria this winter, backed Scott's view.

"You could always tell there were coaches-in-waiting. They got the confidence to go into it because they knew exactly what was happening on the footy field when they were players," he said.

Matthews came from the great Hawthorn side of the 1980s which produced senior coaches Terry Wallace, Gary Ayres, Rodney Eade, Gary Buckenara, Peter Schwab, Ken Judge and Peter Knights.

Kevin Sheedy's Essendon premiership-winning sides from the mid-1980s, 1993 and 2000 produced senior coaches including Mark Thompson, Mark Harvey, Tim Watson, James Hird and Damien Hardwick.

Sheedy and triple-premiership coach Mick Malthouse both played in the highly-successful Richmond side of the 1970s.

Triple premiership captain and current Lions senior coach Michael Voss expects more of his former teammates to become senior coaches.

"When you have a successful era like that, there's some pretty smart cookies running around," he said.

"I'm sure that clubs will tap into that. I'm certainly not surprised there's been a few coaches come off the back of that and hopefully a couple more to come.

"I'm sure that Geelong, in six, seven, eight years time there will probably be a number of coaches that fall out of that program also."

Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang

Leigh's lion pride now in coaches box

Dengan url

http://sudahterlupakan.blogspot.com/2013/03/leighs-lion-pride-now-in-coaches-box.html

Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya

Leigh's lion pride now in coaches box

namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link

Leigh's lion pride now in coaches box

sebagai sumbernya