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Opinion
There are explosive rumours coming out of West Coast that coach Adam Simpson and Eagles CEO Trevor Nisbett are set to face off in a game of rock, paper, scissors with the loser having to leave the club immediately.
Yes, the idea this could decide the fate of either Simpson or Nisbett is absurd, but given the club continues to maintain the illusion of normalcy after another historic bloodbath, it might be the best way to break the deadlock.
Despite the inner chaos brewing within the club and West Coast’s horrifically hapless showing on the field the Eagles are catatonically incapable of making a decision.
The club is stuck in a Groundhog Day cycle. But unlike Bill Murray’s character Phil, who manages to finally climb over several philosophical brick walls, West Coast is stuck in a time loop, repeating the same mistakes.
So, the Eagles need to show some class and dignity and put Simpson out of his misery.
The 2018 premiership coach doesn’t deserve this level of humiliation. No coach does.
It’s like watching a poacher bludgeon a baby seal to death.
After the Eagles were demolished by the Swans on the weekend there is nothing left to spin. It’s time to stop pretending.
It would be like a Wall Street stockbroker telling his clients: “Look, I know you’ve all lost millions of dollars each over the past few months, but trust me, once I’m back from the Bahamas, our luck will change.”
West Coast needs to desist from the inauthentic, even unctuous nice-club persona and sack Simpson in a display of mercy because the embarrassing losses must be having a pernicious impact on his wellbeing.
In reality, several heads should roll at West Coast but the entrenched social norms of the AFL demand a coach be shown the door after a team hits rock bottom.
Adam Simpson. (Photo by Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images)
Whether Simpson, who is contracted until 2025, deserves to go has become redundant.
The Eagles can no longer roll out that tiresome, over-abused encomium he is the right man to rebuild the club. At this stage in West Coast’s development, there isn’t a coach in the AFL that could turn the club’s dire misfortunes around.
But after the Sydney debacle, Simpson still maintains he wants to lead the club. One has to admire his mental fortitude.
There had been reports previously the board was divided about whether to turf out either Simpson or Nisbett.
Surely by now, the warring factions have smoked the peace pipe and universally agree that some brutal decisions need to be made at the club.
West Coast’s losses have reached shambolic levels never before seen at the club.
Let’s get the ugly, unwanted records out of the way. The 171-point mauling against the Swans is the biggest loss in the history of the club. West Coast conceded its highest-ever score – 205 points.
It was the equal fourth-biggest margin since the birth of the AFL.
Almost half of the West Coast players had fewer than 10 possession against Sydney.
The Swans had 12 separate goal-scorers and many others were lining up to join the party.
West Coast’s on-field performance has gone beyond a joke and become toxic.
West Coast has almost had a religious sense of belonging in the AFL because of their brand and success, but the club hierarchy can no longer pretend they’re blissfully unaware of how catastrophically crap they’ve become.
A few weeks ago I wrote that it would be reckless and foolish to solely blame Simpson for the club’s woeful form given the football gods have so cruelly targeted his team.
Now West Coast has no other choice but to sack him just to prove there is still a heartbeat at the club and preserve some professional integrity.
Yes, the Eagles have been crippled by injury but that excuse has become stale and lame.
When they got thumped by the Hawks last month, pundits were calling it the darkest day in the club’s history.
But after the farcical display on Saturday evening, the Eagles have plummeted to a level of bleakness befitting a Jean-Paul Sartre novel.
(Photo by James Elsby/AFL Photos via Getty Images)
And West Coast’s existential woes appear seemingly unstoppable.
Footy fans can get caught up in puzzlingly overwrought emotions when their team is continually insipid and uncompetitive. But the growls of anger and rage have hit new highs.
But it’s worse than that. The fans withering venom towards West Coast means supporters are becoming increasingly disengaged.
Anger is morphing into apathy.
Canadian political philosopher John Ralston Saul once argued for an economic system to flourish it had to be killed economically and socially to be reborn clean and healthy.
If West Coast are going to return to being a powerhouse, then unfortunately the Eagles are going to have to mercifully terminate Simpson and a few others.
If the club doesn’t make some wholesale changes soon, it will be doomed to relive the same day over and over again, until West Coast gets it right.
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