St Kilda coach Ross Lyon has admitted to trying to poach Andrew McQualter out of Richmond just months before he was given the interim role at Punt Road.
McQualter will coach the Tigers for the remainder of 2023 and could be in the frame for the full-time gig after Damien Hardwick stepped aside earlier this week.
Lyon coached McQualter as a player in his first stint at St Kilda, and the Saints coach on Wednesday revealed he made an approach when returning to Moorabbin late last year.
“I tried to pinch him to be honest. He probably never told the Tigers that,” Lyon said.
“We sort of went pretty hard. If I was going anywhere else I had him lined up to come - if I could get him.”
McQualter has emerged as a bolter for the full-time job at Punt Road after he was given the interim role over the likes of fellow Richmond assistants David Teague and Ben Rutten.
In recent years, several caretaker coaches have gone on to claim the head role the following season with Brett Ratten at St Kilda, Rhyce Shaw at North Melbourne and Teague at Carlton all claiming the job in 2020 after acting as interim bosses in 2019.
While that trio were lucky enough to keep their jobs, the likes of Robert Harvey (at Collingwood in 2021), Mark McVeigh (at GWS in 2022) and Leigh Adams (at North Melbourne in 2022) are other recent caretakers that weren’t retained beyond their initial period.
With McQualter now having 13 games to prove himself as a senior coach at Richmond, SEN’s Sportsday’s Kane Cornes, Gerard Healy and the AFL Record’s Ash Browne discussed what chance the 36-year-old is to be leading the club into 2024 and beyond.
Cornes: “Where do you see the Tigers?
“Andrew McQualter is going to take over as coach and I did note the words of Neil Balme and how high he (McQualter) is regarded there.
“It was mentioned last night about Ross Lyon and the connection there and Ross has since spoken about that he tried to poach him (to come and join St Kilda’s staff).
“Is he in the frame (to take over on a full-time basis)?”
Healy: “He would certainly be in the frame.”
Cornes: “I would have never thought he would be in the frame that they’d go with the caretaker, but the more I think about it and digest it today, the more I think it's likely.”
Browne: “I think he's got a big show if he coaches well.
“There are one or two big names out there, if they can't get them there's sort of a revolving door of coaches, if that doesn't happen, then he's got 13 rounds to win the job.
“It's happened recently that the caretaker coach has got the main job.”
Healy: “I've said this a few times since the big announcement that just remember who's on top of the ladder and who's coaching (Collingwood and Craig McRae).
“I mean, the big names don't necessarily turn your footy club around.
“If you've got someone like McQualter who is highly, highly regarded by some really heavy weights in the industry … I reckon it's almost his job to lose.”
Cornes: “Equally though, caretakers that get the job haven't had a lot of success recently.
“That may weigh on the decision.”
Healy: “Yeah, but there are always exceptions, I’ll give you one, Paul Roos.”
McQualter has worked at Richmond since 2014 and he has been one of the club’s assistant coaches since the premiership-winning 2017 campaign.
His first game in charge of the Tigers comes on Sunday when they host the Power at the MCG.