Brendan Fevola: AFL star says joining Richmond Tigers AFLW coaching staff was like being ‘drafted’

One of the AFL’s most colourful characters, Brendan Fevola, has joined the Richmond Tigers AFLW coaching staff ahead of the 2025 season and says it was like being “drafted”.

The three time All-Australian and two-time Coleman Medallist will don the black and gold as a specialist coach to bolster the Tigers awareness around the forward pocket and hopefully help them deliver a swag of goals in the coming season.

Fevola’s new role within the women’s will focus on forward play, development, craft, and skill acquisition according to the Tigers club and comes off the back of a .successful coaching stint with country interleague side for the last two years.

Richmond Head of Women’s Football Kate Sheahan said that Richmond’s players would benefit greatly from Fevola’s expertise and energy.

“To have a former champion of the game so passionate and invested in women’s football is exactly the type of person we want involved in our program,” Sheahan said.

“His energy is infectious; he has coached his own team, and his on-field resume speaks for itself. However, what has really stood out when talking to Brendan—who is, of course, a father of four girls—is his genuine excitement for women’s football.

“Brendan will regularly be on the track at our training sessions, and our players are thrilled to have him on board.”

Fevola, 44, booted 623 goals across 204 games for Carlton and Brisbane and was one of the most revered forwards in the game for a number of years..

The one-time AFL bad boy, said the move came about after a chance meeting with Kate Sheahan.

“She was picking my brain about footy and asked me if I’d like to pursue a coaching career and help out with the girls,” Fevola said on his radio show Fifi, Fev & Nick.

“I went in there [on Wednesday], met the CEO, met the AFLW girls, the AFL boys were training.

“It was like my first day being drafted [...] I had this young boy feeling.

“Mon Conti, who’s a superstar for the Tigers, she won the equivalent to the Brownlow for the females not last year, the year before. She was like ‘oh wow this is cool. Hey, Fev, can you carry all my boxes to the car because I can’t lift them’. She got me on the tools!

“I’m pretty excited to get down there, I want to join in the training and help because I think women’s footy has come a long way and my expertise in what I know, especially forward craft and they’ve got a couple of gun forwards down there. I was in there yesterday watching tape of the girls, at stoppages, forward stoppages.”