{"id":844470,"date":"2026-08-05T13:58:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T13:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/844470\/"},"modified":"2026-08-05T13:58:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T13:58:12","slug":"afl-news-2026-john-longmire-speaks-on-adam-goodes-booing-regrets-not-staging-a-walk-off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/844470\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL News 2026: John Longmire speaks on Adam Goodes booing regrets not staging a walk-off"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former Sydney<\/a> coach John Longmire<\/a> regrets not doing more to support champion player Adam Goodes<\/a> during the final years of his career where the dual Brownlow Medallist was booed relentlessly by fans around the country.<\/p>\n

The 2012 premiership coach, in his autobiography: \u201cPain, Perspective and Premierships \u2013 My Autobiography\u201d, went as far as saying the club should have staged a walk off during a game to send the message that they would no longer stand for what was happening.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Adam Goodes and John Longmire after the 2012 grand final.\u00a0nna\\zgates<\/p>\n

Goodes, one of the game\u2019s all-time greats, has barely been seen in the AFL<\/a> world since retiring in 2015, largely due to the confronting nature of his final years in the sport.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe relentless booing wore him down, particularly in 2015,\u201d Longmire wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter our round eight game against Hawthorn at the MCG, when the booing became incessant, I spoke with our media manager, considering our options. Adam walked past the office and I caught his attention and asked him what he would like us to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe said the only place he felt safe was inside the four walls of the football club, as there he could focus on his job and not be distracted by what was going on outside the club.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt became a massive story \u2013 not only in the AFL but in the wider community too. Everyone was talking about it. It was impossible to escape, especially for Goodesy. We tried to keep the focus on the footy, but it just didn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn hindsight, I should have threatened to pull our players off the ground if the booing didn\u2019t stop. It might not have changed anything but it would have brought the matter to a head and forced the industry \u2013 and the community \u2013 to consider what this continued behaviour was doing to one of the game\u2019s greats.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would have been an extreme act \u2013 but then what was happening to Adam was extreme too. Unfortunately, there were no guarantees anything would change.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt saddens me to know that the place Adam once felt most comfortable \u2013 on the football field, showing his skills to the world \u2013 ended up being the place where he felt most uncomfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tensions with fans began rising when Goodes called out a teenage Collingwood fan in 2013 for calling him an \u201cape\u201d during a game, but it reached fever pitch after he performed an Indigenous inspired celebration after a goal in the faces of Carlton fans.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe breaking point came after a game against West Coast in Perth, where the booing had reached a crescendo. On the Monday morning, Adam called me. He was emotional, saying he couldn\u2019t come to a team meeting,\u201d Longmire continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cJarrad McVeigh was in my office at the time, preparing for the meeting with me. We immediately jumped in the car and drove to Adam\u2019s place in Bondi. He was broken, drained emotionally and physically.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were numb initially, then I started to feel real anger, especially at those with public profiles who were so vocal about what they believed, without taking any time to understand Adam\u2019s perspective or feelings.<\/p>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t been able to forget what those public voices said at the time, and how they convinced themselves, and so much of society, that they knew best. I won\u2019t name them here; they know who they are. The AFL should have acted to stop the booing, but it didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

\u201cIts leaders have conceded that, and while their apology was better late than never, they missed a chance in time that they couldn\u2019t get back. The gesture didn\u2019t come until 2019 when the AFL and the 18 clubs apologised to Adam \u201cunreservedly for our failures\u201d.<\/p>\n

The AFL\u2019s apology to Goodes came well after his retirement<\/a> from the game. He has since rejected induction into the Australian football Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n

Goodes was named Australian of the Year in 2014, something Longmire felt only added to the booing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Sydney coach John Longmire regrets not doing more to support champion player Adam Goodes during the final…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":844471,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-844470","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\/844470","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=844470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/844470\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/844471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=844470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=844470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=844470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}