Collingwood president Eddie McGuire has warned fellow AFL club Gold Coast to tread carefully as they try to poach Magpies football director Rodney Eade.
The Suns want to lure Eade back to senior coaching to replace Guy McKenna and it is understood they have tabled a three- or four-year deal.
Eade has a strong resume, having led Sydney to the 1996 grand final and also guiding the Western Bulldogs to the 2008-09 preliminary finals.
He joined the Magpies in late 2011 and since last year has been their football director.
“They’ve been coming to him, it hasn’t been ‘Rocket’ auditioning or applying for a job,” McGuire said on Triple M.
“So they’ve shown interest and we know that that’s the situation, so we’ll just let it unfold.
“But at some stage someone from the Gold Coast, if they don’t want to get an inducement to break a contract blister, want to make a call to the executive of Collingwood and do it the right way.”
McGuire said Eade had been as honest as he could about the interest from Gold Coast.
But the Magpies boss is unimpressed that the Suns made contact with Eade without first going through Collingwood.
“It would be a courtesy, I think, to call and say ‘do you mind if we speak to the bloke?’,” McGuire said.
“That would be clear the way a little bit better, you’d think.
“It’s probably a bit late (for that).”
McGuire added the AFL’s new restraints on club football department spending could make it more difficult for the Suns to recruit Eade.
And he expects Gold Coast to compensate Collingwood if Eade goes.
“Certainly when you have people on long-term contracts and you have your people in place, then to do a deal, you have to do a deal,” he said.
“Part of that would be, they’d want to be paying part of his fee.
“I don’t think there would be any problems, but what they have to do is, they have to do a deal.”
AFL commentator Luke Darcy, who played under Eade at the Bulldogs, has no doubts the veteran coach would be interested in coaching the Suns.
“My inkling is that he has unfinished business in that department,” Darcy said.
“He got very close with Sydney and very close with the Bulldogs and he’d be a great choice – he’s a great coach.”
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