Kane Cornes has one big question coming out of the AFL off-season: Where’s Bevo?
This summer has been a tumultuous one at Whitten Oval, with assistant coaches turned over, key players out of contract and a review into the club’s football department ultimately easing the workload on head of football Chris Grant.
It has also been reported that Grant and Beveridge have a frayed relationship.
Despite all of this, Cornes feels Beveridge has been absent from the public sphere while other coaches in the AFL have fronted up to speak to their fans.
“I want to ask if there’s more than goes into coaching than just coaching the team, because there’s one coach in particular that I think has gone missing publicly this off-season,” the Power great told SEN Breakfast.
“What is the responsibility for a coach like Luke Beveridge to front up more and be more accessible to the media and therefore the club’s fans?
“There’s been a lot of change at the Western Bulldogs, they’ve just completed the review, we haven’t really heard from anyone, in particular Beveridge, since Chris Grant has essentially been demoted.
“There’s been stories about tension between them, they’re in the lowest two to three clubs in terms of supporter bases in Melbourne and I think we need to hear from him more.
“He’s essentially been invisible this summer, Bevo. I’m calling it ‘Where’s Bevo’?
“Compare it to other coaches this off-season. Chris Fagan will be live in studio with Garry Lyon and Tim Watson tomorrow. Michael Voss has done an extended interview with AFL Media. Justin Longmuir, do you think he wants to front up, he’s done a lot of media in Perth, Damien Hardwick’s done the same, Adam Kingsley’s been everywhere.
“I don’t reckon Sam Mitchell would have really wanted to document his serious illness in New York, but he did that with The Age. Ken Hinkley probably didn’t want to turn up after going out in straight sets last year, but he was on SEN last week. Simon Goodwin the same, he came into SEN and did a big sit-down interview, Ross Lyon, John Longmire was with us last week on SEN.
“Adam Simpson has won five games in two years and fronts up almost weekly in Perth and Luke Beveridge is missing.
“What’s the responsibility on the coach to actually accept the media requests and talk publicly about the issues going on at the footy club?”
