After two years in the top job at his hometown club, former Carlton and North Melbourne AFL spearhead Jarrad Waite is set to step down at the end of the 2025 campaign, with the Saints announcing Nicholas Pearson will take the helm of the Saints on a two-year contract.
Pearson, currently coaching in Queensland, joins the club with more than a decade of experience under his belt and a proven track record of success on the Gold Coast.
“We’re pretty thrilled to be honest, we’re still pinching ourselves a little bit,” Saints vice-president Ricky Symes said.
“We cast the net fairly wide in terms of coaches, playing and non-playing coaches, and we’re obviously really, really focused on the kids at our club and developing them, but also (want) the ability to bring some players into the club to have an immediate impact as well.
“It’s sort of a double-edged sword trying to get a person that can potentially attract some players, but also with a proven track record of developing players as well, so we’re pretty stoked to be honest to have got Nick, it’s going to be very exciting.”
Having hoisted the cup with QFA side Carrara AFC in his first year with the club in 2018, before moving up the road and securing back-to-back flags at Pacific Pines in 2022 and 2023, Pearson has most recently made his mark at QAFL club Morningside, taking the reserves to a minor premiership and grand final appearance in 2024 in his role as development coach, while also playing an important role in the club’s QAFL senior premiership in the same season, managing the magnets and strategy from the bench.
With such an impressive resume behind him, Pearson was in hot demand, and it took a stroke of luck for the Saints to land their man.
“By chance Nick reached out to us and I had a couple of discussions with him,” Symes said.
“He had already been offered some coaching jobs at some really good clubs and even at VFL level, so we were sort of late to the party, but fortunately for us the stars sort of aligned for both of us.
“(Pearson) is a career coach, that’s what he wants to do, and that’s why he’s coming to Victoria, because he wants to be in the footy heartland, I suppose.
“He has always wanted to make the move to Victoria to further advance his coaching and he sees an opportunity with us to develop players and up-skill himself, but also make us a much better club at the same time. We are very fortunate we were in the right place at the right time.”
While there is plenty of excitement around the club about its new mentor, there is perhaps even more love for its outgoing coach.
Symes was at pains to point out how important Waite, who took on the role of senior coach at the beginning of the 2024 season, had been to the club, with his devotion and willingness to impart all of the knowledge gained from 244 games of AFL experience to the young Saints group irreplaceable.
“‘Waitey’ has obviously stepped aside, he’s still travelling from Melbourne and has a young family, it’s just really difficult for him to continue to do that travel,” Symes said.
“In terms of what he has done for our club, I said this to him the other day, but we will be forever indebted to him.
“You get guys with that sort of profile and they can flutter in and out of clubs a bit, and we’ve seen it heaps of times, but he — and he’s a Benalla boy I know — but he’s been so invested in the club and he’s still so invested in the club.
“He just wanted to develop the kids and work with the kids and the win-loss record, at no stage, has that concerned him, because he knows we’re on the right path, so he’s just wanted to work with our local talent and develop them.
“He really has set it up for someone to walk in and reap those rewards, so, like I said, we will be forever indebted to him and I can’t thank him or speak highly enough of him or what he’s done for our club, he’s been incredible, absolutely incredible.”
Pearson, along with his wife Danielle and their son Jack, are wasting no time in moving to the Rose City, with Symes hopeful the new coach will even catch the final home game of the season.
“He’ll be here in the next month, he’ll come down as soon as he can,” Symes said.
“We’re hoping he’ll be able to attend our last home game against Mansfield, him and his family, and then he’ll be down a couple of weeks after that and start to get things sorted for pre-season, obviously we’re still a little way away from that, but also meeting with current and potential players.
“That’s the great thing about it for us, it’s exciting for our group, but it’s exciting for the town, because he’ll be really good for junior coaches in the area, guys that are at other clubs that just want to get better, he’s going to give them that opportunity as well.
“There’s not many better credentialed coaches that are going to come to our area than this guy, it’s really exciting for footy in general.”
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