Former Collingwood recruiter Matt Rendell can’t see Nathan Buckley coaching the side beyond 2021.
The Pies coach told reporters on Tuesday that he did have the desire to coach on beyond this season, while the club has stated that a decision would be made at the end of the season.
Speaking on SEN’s Dwayne’s World, Rendell said he believes the Magpies haven’t recovered tactically from the loss of Justin Longmuir from their coaching ranks and Buckley had to take some responsibility for that.
“At the end of 2017 they do the review and the review basically came out as ‘Nathan, you’ve got to let people do their jobs, you can’t control everything’," Rendell said.
“If I said Bucks was a controlling person, 100 per cent of people at the footy club would say yes he is.
“By the nature of being a controlling person, you don’t trust anyone. That’s why you want to do it all yourself.
“People ask me, what’s the culture like at the footy club and I go it’s a culture of mistrust. No one trusts anyone to do their job and it needed to change.
“And it did change. (Buckley) did let people do their jobs and another really important thing came out of it. Justin Longmuir came into the club.
“I rate this bloke very, very highly and you can see what sort of job he’s doing with Freo at the moment.
“He came in and rearranged the whole team defence. There’s players on record in 2017 saying they’ve got no idea (what the game plan was).
“It wasn’t discernible what they were trying to do. It was very discernible what they were trying to do in 2018 and I reckon Longmuir rearranged the whole thing on team defence.
“Their team defence started their offence and that is a tried and proven formula over the years.
“He rearranged the whole defence and they have a super year and miss out by a kick with really bad injuries.
“We go into the following year and they were lucky to finish in fourth position, Hawthorn did them a favour knocking off West Coast.
“They lost the unlosable against GWS, which can happen. I think they tried to play conservative footy and tried to get through the game without getting hurt until the game was virtually gone.
“The biggest issue was they lost Justin Longmuir after that season. What I saw on the weekend against Essendon was it’s regressed back to 2017.
“Players not looking like they know what to do and no discerning game plan.
“The club lost Longmuir, they look like they’re heading back to 2017.
“Longmuir did a couple of things (after getting the Fremantle job). He went and grabbed a guy extremely highly respected at Collingwood in Matthew Boyd. Players loved him.
“The other thing he did when he went over there is he grabbed a much-loved player who the club couldn’t keep and I’m pretty sure it was because of the Dayne Beams deal and they had no money, but they lost James Aish.
“Aish was really good in 2018, he had a quieter year last year, but he’s been in their top five players for Freo this year and is back to his best.
“You take Aish, Adam Treloar, Jaidyn Stephenson and Tom Phillips out of that team. Throw those four back in the team and they look so much better.”
Based on all of the above, Rendell believes the Magpies need a fresh start with a new coach in 2022.
“If I’m any judge after watching that, and unless something changes massively, I can’t see how Bucks will be coaching the team next year,” he said.
“He might be saying he wants to do it, he might be saying he wants to do it, but he’s put the talk to bed.
“I’m going to say that he won’t be coaching them next year on what I saw on Sunday.”
Rendell was not happy with some of the matchups and decision making during the Anzac Day loss to Essendon.
“We spoke about Isaac Quaynor on Toby Greene … I can’t believe Jack Madgen was lining up on Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti on the weekend. It was just the worst matchup I’ve ever seen.”
“I couldn’t work it out and he kicked five. He didn’t kick five on Jack, but you had Quaynor and John Noble there and I thought they were perfect matchups for him.
“I’m really worried about where they’re going. This is a crucial game for them on the weekend, but I can’t see them making the eight.
“They’re playing the kids. They brought Jay Rantall in and he’s a running machine.
“I’ve gone, what a perfect opportunity to put him on a Darcy Parish or a Zach Merrett. No. He was stuck in the forward line.
“Why would you bring in a midfielder who’s a running machine … I thought he might learn more playing on one of those two blokes than he’ll learn in his next 10 games.”
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