Chris Fagan will celebrate a double milestone against St.Kilda at Marvel Stadium on Friday night – his 150^th game as an AFL coach and his 62^nd birthday – to confirm his standing as the patriarch of modern day coaches.

Fagan, the 52^nd coach in AFL history to reach 150 games and only the second to this mark without having played at the elite level, will be more than seven years older than the next-oldest 150-gamer.

The second oldest 150-game coach, and the only other 150-gamer who didn’t play in the VFL/AFL, was Adelaide’s Neil Craig at 54 years 229 days in 2010.

To complete the top five, Footscray’s former Hawthorn premiership Alan Joyce was 53 years 246 days in his 150^th and last game in 1996, Port Adelaide’s Ken Hinkley was 52 years 265 days at 150 in 2019 and North Melbourne’s Denis Pagan was 51 years 212 days at 150 in 1999.

Among other current coaches, the Bulldogs’ Luke Beveridge was 50 when he coached his 150^th game in 2021, North Melbourne acting coach Brett Ratten was 49 in 2021, St.Kilda’s Ross Lyon was 46 in 2005, Sydney’s John Longmire 46 in 2017 and West Coast’s Adam Simpson was 44 in 2020.

Chris Scott, a dual Brisbane premiership player set to become the 24^th AFL coach to reach 300 games this week, was 41 at 150 games in 2017, while twin brother Brad, now coaching at Essendon, was 40 at 150 at North in 2016.

Recently-retired Richmond coach Damien Hardwick was 43 at 150 games in 2016, and North coach Alastair Clarkson, on leave for personal reasons, was 43 at 150 in 2011.

It is a measure of Fagan’s standing in the game and his ability to interact with players as much as 40 year his junior (and more) that he’s been able to put together such a phenomenal career. Especially when he started at 55 after nine years as an assistant-coach to Neale Daniher at Melbourne (1999-2007) and nine years as assistant coach turned football manager at Hawthorn (2008-16).

It is a career that began in Round 1 2017 against Gold Coast at Carrara, when the Lions won by two points. Only six members of the Brisbane side that day are still at the club – Daniel Rich, Dayne Zorko, Ryan Lester, Darcy Gardiner, Harris Andrews and Eric Hipwood.

Fagan, a Tasmanian Hall of Famer after a stellar career as a player and coach in the Apple Isle, took over a Lions side that had finished 15^th-17^th-17^th in the 18-team AFL competition in 2014-15-16, having won just 14 of 66 games. And seven of those wins were in 2014.

Revered as a father figure by his players, he did the tough yards with the Lions in 2017-18, going 10-34 as he restored the club to some sort of respectability across the competition.

But in 105 games since then he’s enjoyed a 72-33 record, with a strike rate of at 68.6%. Only Geelong’s Chris Scott, the 2022 premiership, has a better record in that time at 75-34.

Only Scott, with 13 finals from 2019-22, has coached more finals in the last four years than Fagan’s nine, and only Scott, Fagan and Beveridge have taken their team to the finals in each of the last four years.

In 149 games Fagan has used 77 players, including 14 100-gamers – Hugh McCluggage (142), Dayne Zorko (138), Harris Andrews (137), Daniel Rich (132), Eric Hipwood (130), Jarrod Berry (121), Dan McStay (120), Charlie Cameron (116), Oscar McInerney (114), Darcy Gardiner (113), Zac Bailey (107), Mitch Robinson (105), Lincoln McCarthy (103) and Cam Rayner (100). Lachie Neale is at 98.

Fagan, already contracted for 2024-25, is still 88 games behind the Lions’ long-serving coach Leigh Matthews at 237. He would need to coach four more years to top the triple premiership coach, which would put him 66.

Only five other 150-game coaches were still coaching in the AFL beyond their 60^th birthday, and only two were older than what Fagan is now – Collingwood’s Jock McHale was 66 years 265 days in his 713^th game in 1949 and Essendon/GWS coach Kevin Sheedy was 65 years 251 days in his 678^th game in 2013.

Mick Malthouse, who split his League coaching record 718 games between Footscray, West Coast, Collingwood and Carlton, was 61 years 278 days old in his last game in 2015, John Kennedy was 60 year 246 days old when his 412-game coaching career at Hawthorn and Essendon ended in 1989, and John Worrall, regarded as the AFL’s first official coach when he took charge at Carlton in 1906, was 60 years 40 days when he finished his 279-game career with Carlton and Essendon in 1920.

The oldest recorded coach in AFL history is Melbourne’s Frank Hughes at 71 years 48 days in 1965. A 1920-21 premiership player with Richmond and a five-time premiership coach with Richmond (1932) and Melbourne (1939-40-41-48), had retired at 54 after the 1948 grand final but deputised for the great Norm Smith in one game to set a mark that Fagan would not reach until 2030.