James Kelly isn’t shying away from his ambition to coach an AFL club in the future, but the Geelong assistant revealed he isn’t actively chasing any of the vacant roles.
With the consensus that the inaugural Tasmania role will go to an experienced coach, the vacant positions at Carlton and Essendon are the ones that Kelly could potentially fill.
However, the former Cats star, who was narrowly beaten by former teammate and fellow Geelong assistant Steven King for the Melbourne role last year, knows that doesn’t guarantee other clubs are interested in his services.
“… one of the things – and I learned this last year – is so much of this stuff and the conversations happen outside of the person who might go for the job,” Kelly said.
“Last year, when I caught up with ‘Richo’ (Alan Richardson, Melbourne football boss) and then ended up applying for the Melbourne job, a lot of the conversations had been going around in the background unbeknownst to me.
“So I think that’s just sort of the process. You suss out a few people, they talk to the manager, they talk to people I work with.”
Kelly is mindful that being neck deep in the Melbourne process doesn’t guarantee he will be an option elsewhere.
“One thing you’ve got to be careful of is, it’s their process,” he said. “This is with Essendon and Carlton and any job; it’s their process to come up with.
“If they want to do whatever they want to do to hire whoever they want to hire, that’s actually their choice.
“I can’t get involved in that at all. And saying, ‘Well, you should interview me’, or ‘I have an expectation to be interviewed just because I went for the Melbourne job last year, you just let them go through the process and… just work really hard every day here and just keep trying to do my job here.”
Club great James Hird has been linked to a return to the hot seat at Essendon, but that’s not a discussion Kelly is concerned with.
“You have to be living under a rock to pretend it doesn’t have an impact,” he said. “You hear, and you read everything that everyone else does, and you guys (media) fuel the fire in that sense.
“I think, at the end of the day, it’s a bit like what I was saying before about it’s their process.
“So I try really hard to not get involved in that.
“If they want to employ James Hird tomorrow, then they can if they want to. Whether they should or not is for other people to answer.
“But they can. It’s their choice. So you really can’t spend too much time on that.
“But if they decide that James is just going to be part of the process, and then they want another James to be a part of the process, then you just make the decision then.”
X: @krockfootball
