Phil Walsh: Aussie Rules mourns 'most interesting' coach

Walsh rose through AFL ranks, from playing country football to coaching a first-grade team

The murder of Adelaide Crows coach Phil Walsh - a man who had started at the bottom and rose to the top of Australia's much-loved Aussie Rules - has shaken the nation's football community.

Phil Walsh was a country footballer who rose through Australian Football League (AFL) ranks to become one of the game's elite as coach of the Adelaide Crows.

The self-confessed "bogan" was dubbed the AFL's "most interesting coach" after a journey that took him as a teenage player from Australian Rules heartland in the state of Victoria to assistant coaching roles across the country.

Walsh told journalists a near fatal accident in Peru a few years ago had changed his life, prompting him to give up alcohol, coffee and driving.

Tactical innovator

At a recent post-match conference, he drew inspiration from artist Vincent Van Gogh as his team struggled to keep their finals hopes alive this season.

Walsh was considered a tactical genius, but was sometimes frustrated with his team's progress

"At 55, he'd spent his life in football and yet truly we were only just getting to know him," ABC football commentator Gerard Whateley said as Australian sporting authorities and fans reacted with shock and horror to his death on Friday.

"He was a genuine and fascinating man, a tactical innovator," Mr Whateley said.

"He had a compelling way of talking about the game; he had a wicked sense of humour; he could draw in everything from fine art to war into the way he spoke about sport."

Family troubles

As South Australian police charged his 26-year-old son with his murder, tributes for Walsh poured in from across sporting codes.

Fans were deeply distressed at news of Walsh's murder

Local media reported poignant comments Walsh had made about the impact of football on his family over the years, saying he had experienced "a disconnect" with his son "because of footy".

On Friday, his club's motto became a rallying call on Twitter as fans posted photos of the Crows' colours of navy blue, red and gold adorning front doors and mailboxes under the hashtag #weflyasone.

"Our industry is grieving today," said AFL Chief Executive Officer Gillon McLachlan.

"Phil Walsh was a man of boundless energy and enthusiasm, and his death is a tragic loss," he said.

Second sporting tragedy

Cricket Australia extended its "deepest sympathies" to the Walsh family on behalf of the Australian cricket community, as current and former players expressed their shock and grief on Twitter.

"Horrible, horrible news coming out of Adelaide," tweeted former Test star Jason Gillespie from the UK where he plays with Leeds.

"Thoughts are with everyone at this terrible time.#RIPPhilWalsh."

Walsh is being remembered with floral tributes, the club's colours and even teddy bears

Walsh's murder is the second high-profile tragedy in Australian sport in the past year, following the death last November of Test cricketer Phillip Hughes.

Hughes was struck on the head by a ball during a Sheffield Shield match at the Sydney Cricket Ground, and died two days later.

Difficult time

The Adelaide Football Club, known as the Crows, was the first Adelaide side to join the AFL in 1991 as a national competition was launched from the game's Victorian stronghold.

Backers of the code wanted to rival rugby league football's dominance in the states of New South Wales and Queensland.

The Adelaide club issued a statement saying it was "devastated" by Walsh's death and asked media to respect the privacy of family, as well as players, coaches and staff "at this extremely difficult time".

The club's inaugural coach Graham Cornes said the tragic death would be devastating not just for the Crows, one of just two South Australian sides in the national competition, "but the whole state".

But the impact of Walsh's death has spread well beyond the Crows and South Australia.

Walsh played 122 games at three AFL clubs - Melbourne clubs Collingwood and Richmond, and the Brisbane Bears - and had assistant coaching roles at Victoria's Geelong, West Coast in Perth, and Port Adelaide.

He took the senior role at the Crows last October.

Walsh had talked of seeing beauty in frustration

As the club struggled in this season's competition, Walsh spoke last month of taking heart from the frustration he had seen in Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers painting, during a visit to Amsterdam.

"For a bogan from Hamilton like myself, I could actually see beauty in that frustration," he told a post-game media conference.

"So, although our fans are frustrated, we're frustrated, we like to think there are some masterpieces still to be painted this year."

Marie McInerney is a Melbourne-based writer