Essendon legend Tim Watson has called out club coach Brad Scott, saying he “threw the team under the bus” in his post match press conference, following the club’s 10-goal thrashing at the hands of Port Adelaide.
The Bombers have started the season with successive thrashings, extending their 15-game losing streak that dates back to May of 2025.
And it has put Scott firmly on the hot seat, with his future at the club now in focus.
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The coach was fuming after the Power loss on Sunday, calling out the group’s lack of effort, even singling out young forward Nate Caddy for missing an easy goal.
“We’re not hard-nosed enough in defence, full stop, and that’s just not defenders — that’s all over the ground,” Scott told reporters.
“I’m a coach who very rarely questions lack of effort, a lack of fight because you know these guys well enough that they’ll always give that, but there’s no doubt we’re demoralised, and that can appear to look like lack of effort, a lack of fight.
“Nate Caddy is a terrific young man, and he’s a great footballer, but you miss a goal from three metres out directly in front (and) your team’s demoralised.
“It’s my job as coach to keep them up and we’re working extremely hard at our club, we’ve done a hell of a lot of work.
“Probably on the surface, the way results have unfolded the first two weeks of the season … it appears we’ve taken at least a step back with the view to go forward, and we want to build a club and a culture that is based on team-first, and we can’t have selfishness from players who think about themselves.
“And we’ve done a lot of work to make sure we don’t have that. But when things are really hard and you get demoralised, human nature is to think about yourself.
“Our pressure was non-existent. We butchered the ball when we had it.
“We’ve got an enormous amount of work to do on our defence full stop. But when you’re turning the ball over in horrible parts of the ground … no one’s set up to defend that.”
Watson, a former Essendon captain, has labelled Scott’s comments “inflammatory”, saying they don’t help the club move forward.
“Maybe Brad Scott was a genius. Maybe his intention was to put the microscope firmly on Essendon when he spoke post-game and used the word ‘demoralised’,” Watson told SEN.
“Because it certainly has inflamed the conversation around Essendon. It has added to what people already saw by the way the coach spoke.
“I think he threw a lot of the team under the bus by what he had to say. It was almost like he was disassociating himself with what he’d seen in the players and himself and what they’re trying to do.
“The selfishness, the lack of desire to want to compete. Then to pick out the No.1 kid Nate Caddy and to embarrass and humiliate him publicly too about how demoralising it was that he missed that goal.
“He appears to know what he was doing. You can have strong messaging behind the scenes, but publicly using that inflammatory type of wording it then leads everybody to make their own conclusions about where the club is at right now. I just don’t think that was a clever way to go about it.”
Watson believes Essendon might have to accept that their attempts to rebuild under Scott to this point have stuttered, saying they’re at “ground zero”.
“Now is the worst time to be rebuilding because you’ve got Tasmania about to suck all the best young talent out of the competition,” Watson explained.
“If I look at Essendon’s position right now, how many pieces are in place for them to be able to build what they might perceive to be a premiership team in seven years’ time?
“They are at ground zero in their rebuild. A dispirited organisation is what they look like right now.”
Caddy was one of the shining lights for Essendon, kicking four goals from seven shots at goal on Sunday, accounting for nearly half of their scoring shots.
Scott’s decision to single the young key forward out for criticism in his press conference, after Caddy blew an easy shot for goal in the second quarter, also frustrated North Melbourne champion David King.
“(Caddy) was the only one singled out (by Scott) in the press conference. ‘Demoralised us’. I thought mate, this kid tried his absolute tail off,” King told SEN.
Port Adelaide great Kane Cornes praised the 20-year-old for only signing a short term deal with the Dons, and not taking the first big contract offered to him.
Caddy is out of contract at the end of 2027, in line with Tasmania’s entry to the competition, with King warning “he’ll leave” if things don’t improve at Tullamarine.
The dual premiership Roo also cannot believe the Bombers still have the same defensive issues after multiple years stuck down the bottom of the ladder.
“They’ve been on a (15-game) losing streak and there doesn’t seem to have been much change (this year),” King said.
“(Scott) said the loss had nothing to do with structure, now I can’t have that. I just can’t have that.
“We showed three or four edits last night of defensive efforts that are just cold wrong. They’re neither pressing nor holding, no one turns their head at Essendon and says ‘who’s behind me?’.
“It’s easy to talk about the kids and blame the kids. I’m not blaming the kids. This isn’t about how young Essendon is. They’ve got enough players with senior experience,” King said.
“And they just play every week. Who was the last senior player dropped at Essendon to set a standard? They’ve got to shift course of where they’re going.”
Brownlow Medallist Jimmy Bartel however can’t see Essendon sacking Scott mid-season. he concedes says they have clearly gone backwards.
“Port completely dominated a hapless Bombers and there’s serious questions now about what they’re going to do this year,” Bartel told Nine’s Today.
“It’s going to be a long, long year for the Bombers if they keep playing like that.
“I think (Scott) maintains his role. They keep backing him in. They extended his contract not too long ago.
“There’s pressure on him and everyone at Essendon. When you go to their games, you can’t actually work out what they’re trying to do.
“They’ve had a lot of injuries in the last 18 months, but it’s a style and a brand of footy.
“Everyone accepts they’re going to lose games, but you can’t lose in the manner they lost on Sunday and last week.”
Scott is signed through to the end of the 2027 season, with his contract extended early in 2025.
Essendon will face North Melbourne in round three, a team they have beaten 12 times in a row dating back to 2016.
The Roos are equally under pressure after blowing a five-goal lead to the struggling West Coast.
