Fremantle is reportedly considering a rival Victorian coach to replace the incumbent Justin Longmuir should the Dockers have another mediocre campaign in 2024.
Last year, the Dockers went 10-13 for a 13th-placed ladder finish after a 15-1-6 2022 season that saw the Cockburn-based club earn a finals berth.
Fremantle's sojourn to the finals two seasons ago represented its first since 2015, with the club's regression last year raising questions about what went wrong during the 43-year-old's fourth campaign in charge.
Now, ahead of his fifth year leading the purple haze, Longmuir's position as Fremantle coach could be under considerable threat.
According to The West on Friday evening, the Dockers are eyeing Western Bulldogs senior coach Luke Beveridge to succeed Longmuir if Fremantle can't rise above the lows of 2023.
The development, while surprising, aligns with the expiration of Longmuir's contract at the end of this year.
Meanwhile, Beveridge's deal at Whitten Oval stretches through to the end of next season after penning an extension at the end of 2022.
However, amid the Bulldogs' on-field inconsistencies and off-field football review, Beveridge's position doesn't appear as secure as it once was.
Throughout nine years in charge of the Footscray club, Beveridge has led the Bulldogs to the finals in six seasons, including their drought-breaking premiership triumph in 2016.
Albeit, since their grand final capitulation against Melbourne in 2021, the Dogs have looked largely uninspiring.
A Bulldogs-Beveridge parting of ways this year wouldn't be an overly startling outcome, though an immediate relocation to Dockers headquarters would raise some eyebrows.
The 53-year-old has only ever played or coached in Victoria; representing Melbourne, the Bulldogs and St Kilda throughout the 1990s before beginning his coaching career with St Bedes in the VAFA, and then moving onto the big leagues with Collingwood and Hawthorn.
Irrespective of the conjecture surrounding Longmuir's standing in Fremantle or Beveridge's in Melbourne's western suburbs, 2024 shapes as a critical campaign for the pair and their sides.
