Craig McRae (born 22 September 1973) is a former

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

er and the current senior coach of the

Collingwood Football Club The Collingwood Football Club, nicknamed the Magpies or colloquially the Pies, is a professional Australian rules football club based in Melbourne that competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's elite competition. The club w ...

Playing career

Originally from

South Australian National Football League The South Australian National Football League, or SANFL ( or ''S-A-N-F-L''), is an Australian rules football league based in the Australian state of South Australia. It is also the state's governing body for the sport. Originally formed as the ...

club Glenelg, McRae was drafted by

AFL AFL may refer to: Sports * American Football League (AFL), a name shared by several separate and unrelated professional American football leagues: ** American Football League (1926) (a.k.a. "AFL I"), first rival of the National Football Leagu ...

club

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...

as the 22nd pick in the 1994 draft and had an immediate impact, kicking two goals in his first game in 1995, and played every game of that year. McRae was renowned for his ability to kick goals from not only beyond the fifty metre line, but also for his scouting of the ball spilled from the hands of taller players. McRae was known for his determination and fierce tackling skills. The respected small forward/goalsneak retired from professional football after the 2004 Grand Final loss to

Port Adelaide Port Adelaide is a port-side region of Adelaide, approximately northwest of the Adelaide CBD. It is also the namesake of the City of Port Adelaide Enfield council, a suburb, a federal and state electoral division and is the main port for the ...

, which included playing in Brisbane's 2001, 2002 and 2003 premierships.

Coaching career

In 2007 McRae served as Player Development Coach with the

Richmond Football Club The Richmond Football Club, nicknamed the Tigers, is an Australian rules football team playing in the Australian Football League (AFL). Between its inception in the Melbourne suburb of Richmond in 1885 and 1907, the club competed in the Victo ...

. Midway through the 2009 AFL season, McRae took up the head coaching position at Richmond's VFL affiliate club

Coburg Coburg () is a town located on the Itz river in the Upper Franconia region of Bavaria, Germany. Long part of one of the Thuringian states of the Wettin line, it joined Bavaria by popular vote only in 1920. Until the revolution of 1918, it was ...

, when their former coach and fellow Richmond AFL assistant

Jade Rawlings Jade Rawlings (born 9 October 1977) is a former Australian rules footballer who played in the AFL with the Hawthorn, Western Bulldogs and North Melbourne Football Clubs. He served as the caretaker coach of the Richmond Football Club for 11 game ...

was appointed caretaker head coach at Richmond. In 2010, McRae took up a development coach position at the Brisbane Lions, before joining as head of development in 2011. He remained at the club for five seasons. He returned to Richmond in 2016, serving as an AFL assistant coach and head coach of the club's reserves side in the VFL. He took the side to a losing grand final in 2017, before winning a premiership in 2019 in the same year he won the VFL's coach of the year award and the AFL coaches' association's assistant coach of the year award. In 2021, McRae joined the

Hawthorn Football Club The Hawthorn Football Club, nicknamed the Hawks, is a professional Australian rules football club based in Mulgrave, Victoria, that competes in the Australian Football League (AFL). The club was founded in 1902 in the inner-east suburb of Hawt ...

to serve as forward line coach.

Collingwood Football Club senior coach (2022–present)

In September 2021, McRae returned to the

, when he was appointed as senior coach ahead of the

2022 AFL season The 2022 AFL season is the 126th season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior men's Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989. The season features ...

. McRae replaced caretaker senior coach Robert Harvey, who replaced

Nathan Buckley Nathan Charles Buckley (born 26 July 1972) is a former professional Australian rules football coach, player and commentator. He is listed by journalist Mike Sheahan as one of the top 50 players of all time. Buckley won the inaugural Rising St ...

, after Buckley stepped down in the middle of the 2021 season. In just his first season in charge, he led Collingwood to success, winning 16 games and finishing the 2022 season in 4th place, after they finished 17th the previous season. Out of their wins, 10 were by less than two goals. In the

finals series Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which decides a winner for an event ** Another term for playoffs, describing a sequence of cont ...

, Collingwood reached the preliminary finals, where they lost to

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

by one point after trailing by 23 points at the beginning of the last quarter.

Statistics

Playing statistics

, - ,

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is O. J. Simpson murder case, acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the 1994, year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The ...

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1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...

, , , , 4 , 16 , , 28 , , 19 , , 181 , , 49 , , 230 , , 38 , , 18 , , 1.8 , , 1.2 , , 11.3 , , 3.1 , , 14.4 , , 2.4 , , 1.1 , , 1 , - ,

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; ''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of t ...

, , , , 4 , 18 , , 19 , , 16 , , 172 , , 70 , , 242 , , 42 , , 27 , , 1.1 , , 0.9 , , 9.6 , , 3.9 , , 13.4 , , 2.3 , , 1.5 , , 2 , - ,

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The '' Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently ...

, , , , 4 , 16 , , 13 , , 15 , , 150 , , 79 , , 229 , , 48 , , 17 , , 0.8 , , 0.9 , , 9.4 , , 4.9 , , 14.3 , , 3.0 , , 1.1 , , 0 , - ,

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shootin ...

, , , , 4 , 24 , , 41 , , 32 , , 267 , , 73 , , 340 , , 69 , , 37 , , 1.7 , , 1.3 , , 11.1 , , 3.0 , , 14.2 , , 2.9 , , 1.5 , , 3 , - ,

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...

, , , , 4 , 16 , , 9 , , 11 , , 164 , , 69 , , 233 , , 48 , , 28 , , 0.6 , , 0.7 , , 10.3 , , 4.3 , , 14.6 , , 3.0 , , 1.8 , , 2 , - , scope=row bgcolor=F0E68C ,

2001 The September 11 attacks against the United States by Al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror, were a defining event of 2001. The United States led a Participants in ...

^# , , , , 4 , 19 , , 21 , , 20 , , 145 , , 64 , , 209 , , 52 , , 28 , , 1.1 , , 1.1 , , 7.6 , , 3.4 , , 11.0 , , 2.7 , , 1.5 , , 0 , - , scope=row bgcolor=F0E68C ,

2002 File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...

^# , , , , 4 , 24 , , 29 , , 27 , , 193 , , 108 , , 301 , , 61 , , 66 , , 1.2 , , 1.1 , , 8.0 , , 4.5 , , 12.5 , , 2.5 , , 2.8 , , 1 , - , scope=row bgcolor=F0E68C ,

2003 File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A des ...

^# , , , , 4 , 20 , , 26 , , 17 , , 132 , , 79 , , 211 , , 34 , , 62 , , 1.3 , , 0.9 , , 6.6 , , 4.0 , , 10.6 , , 1.7 , , 3.1 , , 0 , - ,

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 6 ...

, , , , 4 , 19 , , 18 , , 17 , , 124 , , 58 , , 182 , , 38 , , 41 , , 0.9 , , 0.9 , , 6.5 , , 3.1 , , 9.6 , , 2.0 , , 2.2 , , 1 , - class=sortbottom ! colspan=3 , Career ! 195 !! 232 !! 196 !! 1759 !! 762 !! 2521 !! 477 !! 362 !! 1.2 !! 1.0 !! 9.0 !! 3.9 !! 12.9 !! 2.4 !! 1.9 !! 11

Coaching statistics

''Updated to the end of the 2022 season''. , - ,

2022 File:2022 collage V1.png, Clockwise, from top left: Road junction at Yamato-Saidaiji Station several hours after the assassination of Shinzo Abe; 2022 Sri Lankan protests, Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka in front of the Presidential Secretari ...

, , , 25 , , 17 , , 8 , , 0 , , 68.0% , , 4 , , 18 , - class="sortbottom" ! colspan=2, Career totals ! 25 !! 17 !! 8 !! 0 !! 68.0% !! colspan=2,

Honours and achievements

Playing honours

Team * 3× AFL premiership player ():

Individual * SA state-of-origin representative: 1999 *

International Rules International rules football ( ga, Peil na rialacha idirnáisiunta; also known as international rules in Australia and compromise rules or Aussie rules in Ireland) is a team sport consisting of a hybrid of football codes, which was developed ...

representative for Aus v

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

: 1999

Coaching honours

Team * VFL premiership coach ( Richmond VFL): 2019 Individual * AFLCA Assistant Coach of the Year: 2019 * VFL Coach of the Year: 2019 * AFLCA Development Coach of the Year: 2012 * AFL Senior Coach of the Year: 2022

Other work

Prior to his appointment as Collingwood Football Club senior coach, McRae was a part-time kicking and catching coach with the

Melbourne Storm The Melbourne Storm are a rugby league club based in Melbourne, Victoria in Australia that participates in the National Rugby League. The first fully professional rugby league team based in the state, the Storm entered the competition in 1998. ...

. Until the end of the 2006 season, McRae was involved in a sports administration business and various football broadcasting roles including radio station

Triple M Triple M is an Australian commercial radio network owned and operated by Southern Cross Austereo. The network consists of 40 radio stations broadcasting a mainstream rock music format and 5 digital radio stations. The network dates back to th ...

, where he hosted a football programme with former Brisbane teammate

Jason Akermanis Jason Dean Akermanis (born 24 February 1977) is a former professional Australian rules football player who played in the Australian Football League (AFL). He is a Brownlow Medallist and triple premiership player who played for the Brisbane Bea ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:McRae, Craig 1973 births Brisbane Bears players Brisbane Lions players Brisbane Lions Premiership players Collingwood Football Club coaches Living people People from Queensland Glenelg Football Club players South Australian State of Origin players Australian rules footballers from South Australia Coburg Football Club coaches Christies Beach Football Club players Hackham Football Club players Australia international rules football team players Three-time VFL/AFL Premiership players