FORMER Adelaide coach Brenton Sanderson is returning to coaching to work alongside Nathan Buckley as an assistant coach at Collingwood.
Sanderson has spent the past two seasons at the AFL as the NAB AFL Academy coach, helping develop the best young talent in Australia, after a successful career at Geelong.
Sanderson, 42, became a good friend of Buckley when they played alongside each other at the Magpies, where Sanderson played four games.
He moved to Geelong in 1995 and played 199 games with the Cats.
The appointment of Sanderson is a win for Buckley as he enters the final year of his coaching contract under pressure to lead the team into the finals.
It comes a week after the club announced it had appointed Graeme Allan as football director, without consulting Buckley.
The decision saw former football director Neil Balme take up an offer to join Richmond as football director, rejecting the Magpies offer to become director of coaching.
On Monday night the club announced that Robert Harvey would be defensive coach and Scott Burns midfield coach in 2017.
In a statement on Thursday, Collingwood said Sanderson would be in charge of the forward line and ball movement.
They decided not to offer former assistants Ben Hart and Steven Grace contracts for next year and further changes are possible after the Magpies finish their VFL finals campaign.
