In an AFL world of corporate-style spin, we shouldn’t slam North’s leaders for speaking their ‘Clarko’ truth

In the annals of coach sackings, North Melbourne’s public evisceration of Alastair Clarkson might rank as the least-merciful we have seen this century.

North president Sonja Hood and Clarkson’s lieutenant and long-time friend Todd Viney did not spare Clarkson’s feelings, nor his reputation.

Clarkson had not implemented an effective game plan, they said. Communication had confused the players. He had not delegated properly. “The message became muddier, and the players felt like it hasn’t been clear,” Viney said.

It was like the livestreaming of an unflattering performance review, except that the subject wasn’t present.

Unsparing and harsh as it sounded, though, it would be perverse to criticise the Kangaroo leaders for offering their blunt version of the truth, and eschewing the easy platitudes when clubs and the AFL so often deploy corporate-style spin.

If it was hard not to respect the brutal honesty, one was still struck at how North had violated, in a sense, the unwritten code for coach removals.

Usually, what happens is that the president and chief executive stand before the media and offer gratitude and platitudes to the man they’ve just shoved (and paid out). Typically, there are hints of where the coach failed – “the message wasn’t getting through”; “the players needed a fresh voice”; “we didn’t get the improvement we needed”.

The media discovers the real story when the club briefs select journalists later; sometimes, we already know the score, as with Michael Voss, who was doomed long before his exit.

We’re often told that the coach was a terrific person (see Voss), even as his professional failings are quietly catalogued. But this was not said of Clarkson, who wore the club’s leaders and staff down.

Watching it, there were two remarkable subplots. The first was the ramifications for Clarkson’s 30-year relationship with Viney, which dated back to their days as Melbourne players and was reinforced at Hawthorn. Notably, Viney had faced the media, not CEO Jennifer Watt – evidently, the club needed a football person to take ownership.

From Clarkson’s vantage, there must be a touch of “et tu Todd” today, given his surprise when Viney told him he was done. Like Brutus, Viney had been willing to plunge the sword in to protect the Republic from Caesar.

Viney’s role may reprise the fallout at Hawthorn, where Clarkson’s friendships, such as that with football boss Rob McCartney, did not survive the racism saga or handover to Sam Mitchell. One would hope not.

There were ides of March for Clarkson, too. Back in mid-March, he had told this masthead: “If they think someone else can be out there, [and] they’re going to do it quicker – I’m all for it.”

Of all the words damning Clarkson, the most telling was when Hood said they were searching for a “modern” coach, who could teach the “modern game”.

This bespoke the apparent belief that Clarkson was an old-school coach, who had not moved with the on-field times and that his prolix, rambling communication style did not suit the Generation Z zeitgeist of TikTok, shorter attention spans and meetings.

In terms of who made the call, Hood and Viney were happy to cite staff and especially player feedback; the impression was of an eccentric uncle whom the players liked but didn’t want to steer their careers or team; he was never in loco parentis in the manner of his longstanding colleague Chris Fagan, who is older than Clarkson and has made a virtue of his paternal qualities.

As a younger coach at Hawthorn, Clarkson’s energy and bull-at-a-gate style – and relentless drive – had seen outrageous success.

That might as well have been 1987. Clarkson, among the last of the old-school temperamental coaches, was removed by a club helmed by women, consecrated at a media conference that was unusually truthful, and unusually unkind.

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