A promising and talented Fremantle playing list was the drawcard for Josh Carr when he decided to return to his former club as an assistant coach.

Carr has built an extensive resume from eight years as a coach, including four years as an assistant at Port Adelaide and four years as senior coach of North Adelaide, leading the Roosters to the SANFL premiership in 2018. 

A premiership player at Port Adelaide and an 83-game player at Fremantle, Carr said that he couldn’t wait to get to work after being announced in his new role on Wednesday.

“I’m pretty excited, the list has been turned over a fair bit in the past three to four years,” Carr told Telstra AFL Trade Radio. 

“I think there’s some talented young kids coming through including (Adam) Cerra, (Andrew) Brayshaw, (Connor) Blakely, (Matt) Taberner and (Alex) Pearce down back.

“I think if everyone is on the park, Fremantle can be more than competitive.

“The sky is the limit in some ways, you never know what the capabilities are of the kids that you haven’t seen. I’m also looking forward to seeing the guys that I don’t know much about.”

Carr confirmed that he was a part of Fremantle’s search for a new senior coach, which resulted in the hiring of former teammate Justin Longmuir.

Carr said that Fremantle spoke to him as a part of their ‘due diligence’ but he never expected to land the role.

Instead he found the discussions fruitful for what eventuated in an assistant coach offer.

“I was pretty realistic, knowing that you’re not going to get an AFL (senior coaching) job from coaching in the SANFL or a WAFL club, so from that chat, we were pretty keen to keep things moving along,” Carr said.

“Once ‘Longy’ got on board, I caught up with both Justin and Peter (Bell) and had a good chat about everything coaching and that led to me taking the job at Fremantle.”

Carr spoke very highly of Longmuir, saying he’s built an excellent reputation in football circles in his time as an assistant coach.

“I’ve known Justin for a long time,” Carr said.

“I knew him as a 16, 17-year-old kid playing state 18s together and then back together when we played at Fremantle. 

“He has a very astute football brain. He’s built great relationships and if you talk to people that have worked with him in the football world, they all talk about his coaching abilities, the way that he sees the game and how delivers that message.

“I’ve been very impressed with him so far and I can’t wait to get working.”