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Brad Scott tees off at AFL for treatment of underpaid assistant coaches
SEN • April 9th, 2025 8:02 pm
Essendon coach Brad Scott has slammed the AFL for their treatment of its assistant coaches.
Scott’s comments come off the back of the earning potential of assistant coaches compared to pre-COVID.
Before 2020, AFL clubs had a soft cap to spend on the football department of $9.68 million. That was slashed to $7.25 million in 2020 but has only rebounded somewhat in 2025 to $7.675 million.
With assistant coaches unable to earn what they once were, the former AFL footy boss thinks that they’ve been disregarded as a cohort by the competition, with spending on entire football departments clearly a low priority.
Having first joined the AFL ranks as a player in 1997, Scott says he’s never seen a coaching group more discouraged.
“In my time in footy I’ve never seen a coaching group more frustrated with a whole range of things,” Scott told the media.
“That’s not to do with umpiring, it’s not to do with even relationships with the AFL.
“It’s more the way coaches are regarded within the AFL. I’ve never seen a coaching group more disenfranchised with the way they’re treated as a whole.
“While the game is blossoming and the game is in great shape, the AFL have clearly said what their priorities are – and coaching and football departments are low on that priority list.”
Perhaps scarily for the competition, Scott thinks that clubs won’t be able to attract former players into the assistant coaching ranks if things remain the same.
He’s also concerned that experienced senior coaches currently working at clubs could look elsewhere into higher-paying careers.
“We won’t only lose them, we just won’t gain them,” Scott said.
“Talk to the Players’ Association about pathways for players into coaching, and their feedback is solid that players don’t want to do it.
“They see what the coaches are doing, and they don’t want to do that.
“They see the benefits in terms of the career in coaching versus the challenges it throws up and they’re voting with their feet and choosing not to pursue it.
“For the first time I remember ever in footy, that’s happening, and that’s been talked about and just disregarded as just a nonsense by the AFL.
“Well, it’s happening, it’s going to continue to happen.”
