{"id":883764,"date":"2026-09-07T23:02:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T23:02:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/883764\/"},"modified":"2026-09-07T23:02:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T23:02:16","slug":"afl-news-2026-alastair-clarkson-sacked-north-melbourne-kangaroos-chris-scott-criticism-footy-classified","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/883764\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL news 2026: Alastair Clarkson sacked, North Melbourne Kangaroos; Chris Scott criticism, Footy Classified"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fresh details have been revealed about Alastair Clarkson<\/a>\u2019s sacking from North Melbourne<\/a> with \u201cconfusing and bewildering player exit meetings\u201d reportedly a point of frustration. <\/p>\n

Clarkson was sacked by the Kangaroos last week<\/a> which was followed by a stinging press conference from North Melbourne bosses Todd Viney and Sonja Hood<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Sacked North Melbourne coach Alastair Clarkson.\u00a0Getty Images<\/p>\n

Viney said players had become \u201cconfused\u201d by Clarkson\u2019s messaging and that his game plan needed to improve.<\/p>\n

Hood had added the Kangaroos needed a coach \u201cthat can coach for the modern game\u201d.<\/p>\n

Clarkson took umbrage with the criticism and told The Age \u201cI feel like my life\u2019s shot\u201d. <\/p>\n

On Nine\u2019s Footy Classified, reporter Damian Barrett provided further explanation around the decision to sack Clarkson. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere was an accumulation of annoyances, a refusal to listen, refusal to change his ways, there\u2019s been numerous requests for Alastair to change the way he\u2019s been conducting business,\u201d Barrett said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a series of confusing and bewildering player exit meetings where players were left unknown as to what he was thinking about them, and even he was unsure of the contract status of some of the players he was talking to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barrett added Clarkson\u2019s exit meetings could have been a deliberate tactic to keep players on edge.<\/p>\n

Speaking on Fox Footy\u2019s AFL 360 on Monday night, experienced Geelong coach Chris Scott joined those taking a swipe at the Kangaroos, saying Viney and Hood had \u201caired all the dirty laundry publicly\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think all coaches everywhere would say, if you treat Alastair Clarkson like that, what hope is there for the rest of us?\u201d Scott said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d like to think when my time is over, they\u2019ll keep the really savage criticism to a private conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n

North Melbourne will now form a committee to select the next coach. <\/p>\n

Matthew Lloyd believes the quality on North Melbourne\u2019s list means the club will be looking for a new coach bounce similar to Steven King at Melbourne. <\/p>\n

\u201cNormally coaches have a bit of a honeymoon period, but I don\u2019t know about this one, because of where the club is at,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor this coach that\u2019s taking over, I wonder were these players precious? Did these players not like being coached?<\/p>\n

\u201cI just think the pressure on this new first time coach will be on from day one.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Nick Larkey of the Kangaroos looks dejected after a loss.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Lloyd then put the heat on the players, with the men\u2019s side not playing finals since 2016.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the moment it\u2019s all about what Alastair did wrong, \u2018Alastair did this, he did that, he\u2019s not up with the modern game\u2019,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow they get their modern coach that comes in, let\u2019s see what these players stand for, who have underachieved and haven\u2019t performed for too long at North Melbourne.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jimmy Bartel also implored the club to make the most of its crisis. <\/p>\n

\u201cI hope North Melbourne are taking stock now of what they can do better as a football club … hopefully they take this opportunity to review their whole entire football department from someone external,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The Kangaroos won nine games this season and finished 14th on the ladder.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fresh details have been revealed about Alastair Clarkson\u2019s sacking from North Melbourne with \u201cconfusing and bewildering player exit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":883765,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85],"class_list":["post-883764","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\/883764","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=883764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883764\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/883765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=883764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=883764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=883764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}