New Essendon senior assistant coach Daniel Pratt and his peers at The Hanger have one of the hardest tasks in football ahead of season 2027.
Alongside other new additions to the club Mark McVeigh (senior coach), John Longmire (general manager of football performance) and Paul Thomas (assistant coach), Pratt will be challenged with a club stuck in the mires of mediocrity.
Speaking on SEN Breakfast, Pratt said the club would look at the blueprint laid out by the current premiers on how to play modern football.
"What Brisbane have been able to do, they don't get stuck in the back half. Their skill is to be able to get it from defensive 50 to their forward third and bring their talent into the game," Pratt said.
"Their ability to lock their ball in their front half, it sounds so simple but getting field position and trying to defend behind that is critical.
"The top four or five teams every year of the last three years, have been the teams to finish in the top four or five on the ladder for field position and then scoring from those opportunities."
During the recent trade period, Essendon secured the perfect recruit to help them model Brisbane.
Half-back flanker Keidean Coleman moved from the Lions to the Bombers in October and will be, in tandem with Archie Roberts and Nic Martin, crucial in how the Dons defend and counterattack next season.
"(Coleman's) ability, especially from the system he has come from and their offence, but how he can attack the game off intercept he is a defender who can defend one-on-one as well," Pratt said
"They are highly valuable and I'm sure he is eager to get into it, especially after the injury hiccups he has had over the last couple of years."
Pratt moved from the Western Bulldogs to Essendon at the end of the season with a glittering assistant coach resume that includes an AFLCA Assistant Coach of the Year award in 2024.
The work of assistant coaches has been widely regarded as undervalued and poorly paid given the work and man hours they contribute to their respective clubs.
After spending more than a decade in assistant coach ranks, Pratt was strong in his stance that his peers need to be more looked after by the league.
"I think the AFL needs to have a good look at it. I'm not going to hang them out to dry on it, but it is a high performance industry and you work to win. You work the hours you have to, to get the outcomes you need," he said.
"I think how we support the staff, not just the coaches, has got to be looked at. We have lost probably five coaches who were experienced this year to lower levels just because of that reason you mentioned (burn out).
"I think we need to keep looking at ways whether that is remuneration, holidays that align with the players and things like that just to continue to get the structure and pathways in and out of coaching right.
"Because this is my 15th year coming up and it is a grind and you need the motivation to stay in the game now when you have been around that long."
