The West Coast Eagles are poised to become the latest club to butcher a senior coach’s exit

Gerard Whateley is sick of the way AFL clubs are edging out departing senior coaches, with Adam Simpson likely to become the latest case.

Several reports out of the west this week have suggested the West Coast board is poised to turn on Simpson and sack their 10-year coach.

It’s seemingly a change in rhetoric from the Eagles, who had pledged to stand by Simpson ahead of what looms as a full list rebuild.

Reading the tea leaves, Whateley believes West Coast should have done Simpson the dignity of ending his tenure this weekend.

“It’s almost like they are just waiting to say it out loud and I think, really uneasily, they’re probably waiting for them to get annihilated by the Bulldogs on the weekend and then move after that,” he told AFL Nation.

“When you reach that point, the Eagles should have sacked him this week. They’re not doing the right thing by him.

“Call him in, shake his hand, write him the cheque for the money he’s owed and then carry him out as a premiership coach.

“He’s left there today pleading for a job that is probably already gone. I don’t feel like we’re learning anything.”

As recently as last week, CEO Trevor Nisbett had declared Simpson would be at the club in 2024.

But a two-win season that includes two derby losses, one of which was a 101-point shellacking last week, looks set to claim Simpson’s scalp.

“If they get beaten by 100 points (this weekend) this (sacking) will be the greatest formality we’ve ever seen on Monday and we’ll go, ‘really, is that the best way we could have done it’?” Whateley continued.

“This is the job he signed up for with his eyes wide open, they’ve all been in concert the whole way through but now it looks like there’s the fracture.

“I think for a period of time he felt like he was probably going to be the designated survivor… now it looks like, as is usually the case, the coach will be the major casualty.”

If Simpson departs, he’ll become the fourth coach in the last two seasons to be sacked alongside David Noble, Brett Ratten and Stuart Dew.

The processes that saw Ratten and Dew in particular exit faced heavy criticism given both the timing of the respective calls and the two coaches’ contract situations.

Whateley added that West Coast appears to have learnt nothing from the recent controversies.

“There’s a level of losing that can’t be sustained, but just do it. Do it decisively, give the guy his dignity… I have a growing disdain for the way boards are doing this to good people and Adam Simpson is a great person of football and a hero of that football club and they’re still going to do it badly at the end,” he explained.

The Eagles play top eight hopefuls Western Bulldogs and Adelaide in their final two games to cap off season 2022