Expected to be Named Coach at Carlton

In a not entirely unexpected development, Kangaroos coach Denis Pagan has quit the club after ten years at the helm.

Having brought two premierships to Arden Street and led the club to countless finals, Pagan will coach Carlton in season 2003 in a deal said to be worth $A2.4 million over three years.

Senior Kangaroo players Anthony Stevens and Glenn Archer are said to be devastated but Club President Alan Aylett said when announcing Pagan’s decision on Wednesday night, Melbourne time, “It’s not all doom and gloom”.

Thanking Pagan for his contribution to the club since becoming senior coach in 1993, Aylett said the club had done everything in its power to ensure Pagan remained at Arden Street, but would have been irresponsible to offer Pagan a deal beyond its means. In an already parlous financial situation, the Kangaroos must now look for a new coach to take the club into 2003 and beyond.

Contenders at this stage are said to be Rodney Eade – former assistant coach to Denis Pagan who ironically coached the Sydney Swans to a Grand Final against the Roos in 1996 – and Mark Harvey, current assistant coach at Essendon.

Denis Pagan leaves a remarkable legacy at the Kangaroos and is widely regarded as the best coach in the land. It was no doubt a very difficult decision for him to leave the Kangaroos but as he followed Carlton as a boy and once played for the Blues, the decision to leave must have emotional as well as business reasons behind it.

The Kangaroos offer to Pagan included a $A500,000 base with Pagan having to “earn” the shortfall through writing articles for Melbourne’s Herald-Sun and other corporate commitments – commitments which were all too much for the Premiership coach whose main desire is simply to coach.

Pagan reportedly said of his decision: “I'm worried about the Kangaroos, but the Shinboners' spirit will live on without Denis Pagan and it will endure. I knew I had to go today. I had wrestled with myself for a long while and I at least can say the club and the list is in good shape."

The announcement finishes an unbelievable season for the Kangaroos – beginning with star player and captain Wayne Carey’s dramatic exit from the Club in March and ending six months later with its coach also leaving – two events which not even the most cynical football commentator could have predicted.

The Club made the finals against the odds in 2002 and will be expected to build on its talented playing group in 2003.

Pagan’s decision to join Carlton will go some way towards helping Blues President, John Elliott, retain his position. Having secured Pagan, Elliott will be hoping he has also secured his own future at Carlton. However, Ian Collins, CEO of Colonial Stadium and former Blues man who will run against Elliott for President, said that the new coaching moves at Carlton did not change the “sorry state” the club is in. Wayne Brittain, who coached the Blues to their first “wooden spoon” (bottom placing in the 2002 season) this year, is said to be utterly devastated at the decision to replace him.