Could Nathan Bassett coach the Crows?

With the various discussions re the Senior Coaching Position, Nathan Bassett along with Simon Goodwin have been mentioned with the usual suspects Roos and Malthouse.

In respect to Bassett, he is not a current AFL Assistant Coach, nor has any AFL experience coaching wise outside of his playing career. Some have suggested that its not possible for an SANFL coach to go straight into the Senior Role at an AFL club. To my memory, Peter Rhode from Norwood to Western Bulldogs was the last person that did that.

My thoughts are that Bassett could likely be a better candidate. An AFL Assistant Coach has a very limited amount of decision making capability. An SANFL Coach cops the blame for everything. An AFL Assistant Coach has a far more limited input into the side than what the SANFL coach has.

Bassetts record is pretty impressive, He coaches the SA U/18 to success, moved onto Norwood took them from a low position on the ladder to the Finals in his first year and is looking like doing it again despite the sheer numbers that he has lost from his list. Bear in mind that in his first year he was unable to recruit anyone and could only work with what they had from their zone, so no big name players were brought in, only those that he developed himself.

Thoughts?

No it is time for a non South Australian to coach the crows. It is time for Adelaide to grow up and get rid of this tag of Only South Australian's can coach our club. Granted you guys had one dud Victorian in Gary Ayres. Robert Shaw was not that bad but the players didn't like him because he was not a South Australian.

Anybody can coach the crows

Whether they can do any better than Craig is the question that needs to be answered.

As an Adelaide supporter would much prefer they went for someone who has been an AFL assistant for a few years, like a Ken Hinkley, Gary O'Donnell, Leon Cameron or Brenton Sanderson (although would love to see him coaching Sturt) type. Even get Todd Viney back. If keeping it in-house, no objections to Mark Bickley or Peter Jonas (who I wanted in 2005).