Sport
16 October, 2025
First for footy news: Payne will coach Macorna
IN A MAJOR shock, Fergus Payne is the new senior football coach of Macorna which will join the Loddon Valley league next season.
IN A MAJOR shock, Fergus Payne is the new senior football coach of Macorna which will join the Loddon Valley league next season.
The league’s newest side confirmed Payne’s appointment to the Loddon Herald on Tuesday, hours before officially telling members.
Payne last month split with Inglewood in a bitter dispute after two years as coach, having steered the club to its best result in more than two decades, claiming a lack of support from the committee throughout the 2025 season.
Just a week ago he told the Loddon Herald that he had not made any decisions about his football future, but Macorna’s committee rubber-stamped his appointment as coach last Saturday night.
Payne takes over the Tigers as they move to the Loddon Valley competition from the defunct Golden Rivers league.
It is a major coup for Macorna to snare a coach with an intimate and contemporary knowledge of the Loddon league. Tigers president Tenielle Edge told the Loddon Herald: “We are super excited to welcome Fergus to the club.”
Payne, as playing coach, took the Woodies from fifth place on the ladder to the preliminary final this season, losing to eventual premiers Marong.
His surprise move makes the first meeting between Macorna and Inglewood next season a juicy prospect.
Inglewood president Darrell Billett said the news “was hard to wrap your head around, him taking a role in the same league”.
He insisted that the club had offered a firm contract to Payne for 2026 and had assured him of “100 per cent support” before the offer was rejected.
“It seems a bit strange, him coaching against us, but it’s his call.”
Billett said he expected that Payne would try to lure some Inglewood players to Macorna.
“He will probably grab a couple, but that is just the nature of the game.
“He’ll have formed some relationships with the players, but a lot of the boys have committed for next year.
“It would not surprise me if he took a couple of those left.”
Key players including best-and-fairest winner Bregon Cotchett, fellow Loddon Valley Team of the Year representatives Harry Veitch and Seb Erharter, as well as young gun Gabe Nevins, are among those to have re-signed with the Woodies.
Payne told the Loddon Herald last week that 40 Inglewood players had signed an email to the club committee late in the season supporting his reappointment.
However, he described the contract that eventually was put before him after the end of the season, as “a shallow offer”.
Payne’s assistant coach, Jackson Hood, has taken over the senior role for next season.
Macorna finished last in the Golden Rivers competition’s final season, with just one win, but its Under-18 team took home the flag this year for the second season on the trot, so there is obvious potential in its ranks.