by Grant Condon, Maryborough Advertiser
**Article reproduced with permission of the Maryborough District Advertiser**
Carisbrook will launch into the 2015 Maryborough Castlemaine District Football Netball League season under a radically re-designed coachingstructure announced last week.
The runners-up of the 2014 season have announced that Tim McKay will lead the Redbacks into the approaching season following the resignation of Luke Treacy, who led Carisbrook for four years.
McKay will lead the Redbacks’ senior team alongside Adam Hurse and Brendon Tranter who have signed on as assistant coaches.
McKay and Tranter will be non- playing coaches while Hurse is expected to fill a playing position.
Spending the last 12 months taking a break from senior coaching, McKay lands at Carisbrook after an extraordinary run of success with the Skipton Football Club.
Arriving in 2001 at the Emus, McKay was senior coach for 10 years, nine years in the now defunct Lexton Plains Football League and one in the Central Highlands Football League.
In his first year at the club he was an assistant coach in the 2001 premiership before taking over as senior coach and leading the Emus to seven grand finals, winning flags in 2003 and 2005 before going back-to- back in 2009 and 2010. His coaching tenure ended with 138 wins from 174 games and he was awarded a life membership by Skipton in 2009.
“He’s a high calibre coach,” Carisbrook Football Netball Club president Troy Driscoll said of McKay who signed on for 2015 after being approached by Carisbrook.
“He spent 10 years coaching at one club, a well regarded club like Skipton, so he obviously has done something right.
“He’s well respected in the football world.”
The arrivals of McKay, Hurse and Tranter will be the first time that Carisbrook has outsourced its senior coaching position to someone without a recent connection to the club since the signing of Geoff Dixon in 2004.
This is the first time we have someone come from outside the club for some time and I think that’s healthy,” Driscoll said.
“We’re looking forward to someone coming from left of centre.
“All three guys — Tranter, Hurse and McKay — have not had much to do with Carisbrook for some time so they have fresh ideas, fresh outlooks and fresh perspectives.
“Everyone in the playing group starts with a clean slate and I think a lot of the playing group is looking forward to that challenge.
“As a club we’re looking forward to having that different perspective from a coach who has a lot of experience.
“I think we do OK as a club but we still have plenty to learn from different perspectives on and off the ground, and he (McKay) can help bring that.”
Despite a change in coaches, Driscoll said he expected the senior side to continue on with a similar success rate to the 61-10 win-loss ratio Treacy recorded in his four years at the helm which ended with a 16.21 (117) to 9.8 (62) loss to Navarre in the 2014 grand final.
“I don’t think there will be an adjustment period because the playing group has hung together well from last year,” Driscoll said.
“It’s very much the same list and there are about three or four players that will come into the team as well.
“The perspective of a different coach should reinvigorate the playing group and we’ve identified our weaknesses and have guys placed to fill those weaknesses.”
In another major addition to the Redbacks’ 2015 outfit, power forward Nathan Wright will return to Carisbrook.
Wright will return to the club after spending the 2014 season with Ballarat Football League club Redan in which he kicked nine goals in six senior games and 11 goals in six reserve games.
In his last MCDFNL season, in 2013, Wright won the league’s goal kicking award and kicked 95 goals in 18 matches.
It was Wright’s biggest haul in a MCDFNL season having kicked 78 goals and 53 goals in the 2012 and 2011 seasons respectively.
Last Modified on 20/01/2015 15:18