Irish AFL legend Zach Tuohy has revealed all on his fiery clashes with former coach Brendon Bolton in his new autobiography ‘The Irish Experiment’, and one head scratching pre-season moment dubbed ‘biscuit-gate’ has caught a lot of attention.
The 34-year-old from County Laois is widely regarded as one of the greatest international players in the games history, but his hopes of being a one club man were dashed in 2016 when Bolton took over for what remains his only AFL senior coaching role.
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“In the beginning, I was desperate to make it work”, Tuohy wrote in his book of the relationship that would ultimately lead to his exit at the club after playing 120 games. “I found Bolts very intense. It was difficult, in fact almost impossible, to have a casual chat with him about anything unrelated to football… He just couldn’t turn off for a second”.
Tuohy goes on to detail a series of incidents that soured his opinion on the first year coach, with the disagreements beginning before a ball was even kicked ahead of Carlton’s first match under Bolton’s tenure; an exhibition against the Hawks in Launceston.
“When we took off from Melbourne, the flight attendants made their way down the aisle with the refreshments trolley, offering tea or coffee, and a biscuit… from 파워볼 memory, the biscuits were those little shortbread tasty morsels. Why do you need to know this? I can explain,” Tuohy wrote in a book extract published by the Herald Sun.
“When we arrived at the hotel, we were called into the team room for a meeting”. As soon as the players sat, Bolton began.
“‘I’d like any player who ate one of the biscuits offered to them on the plane to stand up’. Now at this point I’m thinking, is this a joke? Surely it’s a joke. But his tone was serious. Players started to stand up. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Mostly I couldn’t believe that I wasn’t one of the ones forced to stand up. It wasn’t like me to miss the opportunity of a biscuit.