{"id":683457,"date":"2026-05-20T17:54:32","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T17:54:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/683457\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T17:54:32","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T17:54:32","slug":"afl-news-2026-adam-simpson-pulls-out-of-carlton-coaching-race-reasons-why-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/683457\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL news 2026 | Adam Simpson pulls out of Carlton coaching race, reasons why explained."},"content":{"rendered":"

Carlton<\/a> has lost another contender in the race to find a new head coach, with Adam Simpson officially declaring he has no interest in taking on the top job.<\/p>\n

Simpson has been working as a coaching consultant at Carlton since the start of the season, having joined on as part of the revamped coaching unit.<\/p>\n

The decision to join the Blues came after a 10-year stint as coach of the West Coast Eagles.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Celebration that got US teen disqualified in title race<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: ‘Ready to fight’: Arrow speaks after devastating diagnosis<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: ‘Leg was still there’: Star’s fear when he woke from surgery<\/a><\/p>\n

Simpson was among the many veteran coaches that had been identified as potential candidates for the job at Carlton, but he has confirmed he is out of the race.<\/p>\n

“I’m not going to put my hand up for any type of role with Carlton, from a coaching point of view,” Simpson said on Fox Footy’s AFL360.<\/p>\n

“It’s difficult when you’re working at the club and mentoring someone. It doesn’t feel right.<\/p>\n

“So people can stop asking me questions on it. I take myself out of contention.”<\/p>\n

\"Adam<\/p>\n

Adam Simpson, former senior coach of the Eagles talks to his players.\u00a0via Getty Images<\/p>\n

While the door has been shut on an immediate future as head coach of an AFL team, Simpson did confirm that he was approached by Carlton about his interest in the role.<\/p>\n

“(We had) a very, very brief conversation,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It was a polite decline with where I’m at, at the moment.<\/p>\n

“You can ask questions of others (if they are interested). For me at the moment, it just didn’t feel right.<\/p>\n

“When you’re working with someone and the coaching staff. To come in and try and, yeah, that’s not quite right for me.<\/p>\n

“But I’m sure whoever takes that job will have a good career.”<\/p>\n

Josh Fraser will remain as interim coach of Carlton until a new head coach is found, although he, too, is not interested in accepting the role in a full-time capacity.<\/p>\n

John Longmire is another contender for the job, but he has refused to publicly reveal whether he is or isn’t interested in accepting a coaching role.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Carlton has lost another contender in the race to find a new head coach, with Adam Simpson officially…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":683458,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-683457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-afl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=683457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/683457\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/683458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=683457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=683457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=683457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}