Western Bulldogs fans are beyond fed up with Luke Beveridge. Most are angry to the point of being irate.
In many ways, Beveridge is this era’s Kevin Sheedy, except a poor man’s version of him.
Both like speaking in riddles – Sheedy had his Martians and marshmallows, while Beveridge spouts indecipherable nonsense. Erratic coaching moves are a signature of both.
At least Sheedy coached a flag on average every seven years, Beveridge will have one in 10 if he survives this year.
Sheedy arguably didn’t deliver enough premierships for his time at the helm, given the talent that he had access to in his time.
Admittedly, he was up against a powerful Hawthorn in the 80s, a club that absolutely maximized the players they had, and an exceptional North Melbourne in the 90s.
Essendon finished on top of the ladder seven times under Sheedy, with another five top-four finishes besides. He consistently had them near the top.
Beveridge has never had the Dogs finishing in the top four on the ladder. A fifth-placed finish is as good as it’s gotten at the end of the home and away rounds, and then only once.
Sure, he won the 2016 premiership from seventh with a miraculous run through the finals, and yes the umpires had their say, but it was truly stunning.
However, such was the unique nature of it, it was the ultimate outlier – and outliers don’t cut the mustard when considering a body of work over a long period of time.
Luke Beveridge has arguably the best player in the game, in Marcus Bontempelli. He has one of the best two ruckmen in the league in Tim English, a first-choice All-Australian last year. He has the best clearance player in Tom Liberatore.
Luke Beveridge. (Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)
There are three more All Australians on the list, Jack Macrae, Caleb Daniel and Bailey Dale with five jackets between them.
Macrae was shunted out of the midfield last year, has been playing like a man whose confidence is shot ever since, and must surely be thinking of taking his talents elsewhere at season’s end. Daniel has been in the VFL and sub vest, while Dale was given the latter last round.
Cody Weightman is one of the most dangerous small forwards in the competition, and no crumbing forward pocket has more goals than him this year.
The Dogs were gifted a number-one pick thanks to the ridiculous Academy rules the AFL has, and every ball not going to him inside 50 is a wasted one.
Aaron Naughton was worthy of an eight-year contract at the end of last season, so that tells you what the club thinks of him.
Sam Darcy is the smoothest moving young tall in the competition, a father-son at pick two, the year after Ugle-Hagan was drafted. Talk about being handed every advantage.
Straight away, almost half the team is made up of elite-level talent. Let alone the likes of Adam Treloar and Bailey Smith (injured for all of this year, but coming off the back half of last season where he under-performed), who would walk into every midfield.
Jake Stringer and Josh Dunkley couldn’t wait to get out of Whitten Oval, and Smith shapes as the same.
But Beveridge does love his jobbers. Oskar Baker is a good old-fashioned dud.
Lachlan Bramble tries hard to take the game on but looks in a similar boat. Lachie McNeil has traditionally been a favourite, Anthony Scott another, and Robbie McComb were the flavours of the month at one point.
Bevo loves playing VFL players in the AFL. Who knows what happened to Roarke Smith. Rhylee West is having a good season after being chopped and changed for years.
Laitham Vandermeer is yet to deliver on his early career promise and shapes as another young talent that will spend years in the wilderness due to the erratic selection nature of the coach.
Riley Sanders is starting to get exposed to it, subbed off in two of his five matches after being taken at pick six in the 2023 draft.
Luke Beveridge is an inconsistent speaker, an inconsistent coach, and gets inconsistent results. It’s the one thing he is consistent with.
Some years, the Dogs are top four for defence. Some years they are top four for offence.
Only once has it been both in the same season, which led to their highest ladder position under his tenure. Most of the time one is strong and the other is weak, but there is no telling from year to year.
As stated previously in other articles on The Roar, clubs are far too conservative with coaches who have been at the helm a long time without success.
Leon Cameron and Nathan Buckley at GWS and Collingwood are the most recent glaring examples.
Ken Hinkley at Port Adelaide and Beveridge at the Dogs are the current two, and there’s every chance Chris Fagan at Brisbane will be next.
Look at what happened to Richmond when they waited too long on Damien Hardwick.
And make no mistake, the Dogs under Beveridge had outlier success in 2016, but that was eight years ago now.
It’s time to go.
Pumping Dougie
Roar Guru
No, it's sulky, irrational, bad loser dribble. But, you be you. :happy:
Charlie Keegan
Roar Guru
Yeah they managed to get out of it when the Blues got wrecked for their brown paper bags
Charlie Keegan
Roar Guru
Yeah they don’t have the brother that’s good at coaching though. Mark McVeigh is the superior coach because of his experience at the Giants and the ACT/NSW side last year
Wikipetia
Roar Rookie
99 was the one. then they had the misfortune of running into the mergasaurus known as the Lions. and Port came good. and they hit the salary cap problem. oh well
Wikipetia
Roar Rookie
Yes I think that was a huge part of the Richmond flags
Don Freo
Roar Rookie
I think the best sides are not marked as much by their stars as by those that execute more humble roles. Last year, for instance, Collingwood was not about the Daicos boys, De Goey or Moore; it was about Mihocek, Cameron, Howe...that kind of player. The absence of weak links.
Wikipetia
Roar Rookie
In terms of the previous seasons, it’s just to help determine to some degree the importance of midfield to success
Don Freo
Roar Rookie
You see, Mr Morris, you are interested in law talking stuff. The rest of us want footy. You're lost on this one. You might be Tom's dad but you are probably the only person in the country who respects his work
Wikipetia
Roar Rookie
Yes I considered that. But the Hawks would have had Dunstall and Brereton types around the club. Giants - ,sheedy, if they wanted to. Geelong - dunno. Swans - Barassi. Richmond had Balme by 2017.
Chris Lewis
Roar Guru
yep, i do not like bagging any players and coaches for similar reasons, I thought Sheedy was overrated, but he did do reasonably well. Bevo won a flag and i suppose he will go when the payers stop supporting him. I hope Dogs win tonite.
Law Talking Guy
Roar Rookie
It wasn't gossip reporting. It was the reporting of who was playing that weekend. That's standard reporting done by near any journalist involved in football. Aside from that, I do actually agree with you regarding what he normally reports on.
Don Freo
Roar Rookie
You need to consider the ethics of gossip-reporting designed only to promote Morris himself. Nothing he reported...indeed, nothing he reports...ever has anything to do with footy. He gossips around the social world with the expertise of a New Idea columnist. Regarding the 'apology' and 'donation'...just PR, which is the industry closest to Morris' insincerity.
Law Talking Guy
Roar Rookie
Yes, well, the full and frank apology by Luke Beveridge, the $20000 donation to a youth mental health charity plus his subsequent acknowledgement at the end of the season that he continued to deeply regret what he said probably negates your own opinion there, Don. And in that instance, Morris' reporting was entirely accurate and blamed Morris for an internal leak at the Bulldogs and accused Morris of impacting the mental health of his team for reporting something that was entirely factually correct and perfectly within the ethical boundaries of reporting.
Don Freo
Roar Rookie
Darcy/Jackson with Fyfe, Brayshaw, Serong, Young is comfortably the best. Witts with Anderson, Rowell, Miller, Humphrey Soldo/Finlayson with Rozee, Butters, Horne-Francis, Drew Grundy/McLean with Heeney, Mills, Warner, Rowbottom De Koning with Cripps, Walsh, Cerra, Hewett McInerney/Daniher with Neale, McCluggage, Ashcroft, Dunkley, Rayner I’d leave out Melbourne and Doggies whose mids get great press but are regularly beaten. Gawn with Petracca, Oliver, Viney but that’s all; very shallow. English with Bont, Libba, Macrae (who they don’t play), Treloar. Top 10 mids? Fyfe is still the best because of what he does at clearances. Serong, Brayshaw, Young, Warner, Heeney, JHF, Rozee, Butters, Neale are all on a par. Players like Bont and Daicos are terrific but Bont goes missing a lot and Daicos gets found out as a mid. As far as past seasons…I never really think about that. The past never impacts on anything this season.
Roger of Sydney
Roar Rookie
Charlie True and also have McVeigh as well, Swans are pretty good at passing the baton
XI
Roar Guru
Considering they got rid of the top 5 in 1990, I don't know that there would have been that many people who remembered how that worked.
Charlie Keegan
Roar Guru
The thing that was most impressive about Sheedy was he was able to take four extremely different lists to winning grand finals. Yes he should have won more flags particularly after 2000 where they were historically good. But the fact that they were able to win the flag multiple times throughout the eighties and nineties but also the coaching landscape was very different back then. I think Bevos biggest problem is a man management one. He doesn’t know how to develop and get the best out of the players on his list. I think you can look at how they’ve managed Jedd Busslinger he should have come in already and he hasn’t.
Charlie Keegan
Roar Guru
The thing is they don’t need to go with Kirk, Dean cox is extremely highly rated as an assistant.
Kick to Kick
Roar Rookie
I’m not one of the “sack-the-coach” brigade. It’s often a lazy reflex of AFL commentators and fans. Across world team sports franchises with stability of management and coaching are the ones with sustained success and thereby financial and membership sustainability. The most obvious cautionary tale is the descent of Manchester United into a rabble after the retirement of Alex Ferguson and the impatience of owners in repeatedly sacking managers in the hope of recapturing past glories. But there are many other examples. It’s no co-incidence that the two most successful clubs in terms of finals appearances in the AFL over the past two decades, Geelong and Sydney, have the longest serving coaches. The sack-the coach mob would have ousted Chris Scott before the 2022 flag because he hadn’t won enough premierships - despite being the most successful home and away coach in the history of the game. This clamour is despite an equalised competition expressly designed to deliver a single flag to a club once every 18 years. Consistent finals presence is a much better measure than premierships. The calls for Ken Hinkley and Chris Fagan to be turfed are just naive and foolish given both clubs are strong performers currently in championship windows. However I have to agree Luke Beveridge has run his course. I don’t think the issue is an inconsistent game style. Tactical change and improvement are what assistant coaches are for. Beveridge seems to have a deeper and more worrying problem - inconsistent people management that erodes the confidence of his playing list. Remember the bizarre and frankly cruel treatment of Jake Stringer, a young man with an apparently fragile mind set but real talent and I think a basic decency that required nurturing. The current treatment of Caleb Daniel is just as baffling. Players seem to move in and out of approval to a point that it’s hard to tell whether loss of form is a cause or the result of being on the outer. Team success is about talent and style but equally about unity, collective loyalty and confidence. To an outsider Beveridge’s style wanders away from tough love into capriciousness. The loyalty of team members to a boss and a cause has to start with fair mindedness and consistency at the top. You have to wonder what Chris Scott and the Geelong hierarchy could do with such a talented but underperforming squad.
Wikipetia
Roar Rookie
ok, just out of interest, and because i know you watch a lot of teams: - what are the top 6 (in order) ruck/starting mids combos in 2024 (include injured players if they are likely to be in finals - if you wish) - who are the top 10 (in order) midfielders in the comp - at a rough guess, where would you rate the combos for each flag winner in the last 10 years (against their peers, that year). -- only if you have time. I think it would be an interesting assessment, and garner responses. -- i have no opinion and am unlikely to garner one this season.