"Having Mick Malthouse as your coach is like being punished for a crime you haven't committed...Malthouse is small-minded, bad-tempered, lacks discipline and shirks responsibility...we know he is a liar...It is yet another pointy arrow in the Collingwood coach's quiver of shortcomings" - Allan Howe, Daily Telegraph, April 24, 2010. 

"Mick Malthouse might be resting in football's lowliest place right now" - Caroline Wilson, The Age, April 13, 2010. 

"Old Malthouse should grow up" - Herald-Sun headline on Andrew Bolt column, April 12, 2010.

What a difference 18 months makes.

In the middle of Collingwood's 2010 campaign, Mick Malthouse's detractors were not only lining up to slam his behaviour during that unedifying encounter with Stephen Milne, but also taking the opportunity to question his record in the coaches' box.

At that point, Malthouse's 26-year stay as a coaching supremo - at Footscray, West Coast and Collingwood - had yielded only two premierships, the last on them coming in 1994 with the Eagles.

So had Mick lost his magic, misplaced his mojo? Had he underachieved and not maximised his return from some incredibly talented squads?

The Milne saga from round three last year seemed to reflect Malthouse's frustration with Collingwood's lack of progress, and also opened the door for his critics to question whether the modern game had passed by the then 57-year old.

That all seems a distant memory now as Malthouse prepares to bow out of the game - at least as Collingwood's senior coach - on Saturday afternoon.

Win or lose, Malthouse will exit the stage to a round of applause - perhaps even from those who have been his greatest detractors.

He will leave the game as a revered figure, who has not only been a fixture on the AFL landscape for nearly four decades, but as someone who will continue to exert an influence on the game.

Collingwood's current game-style has been heralded as the blueprint for future success in the league. Obviously it has led to the Pies being on the verge of back-to-back premiership triumphs, but it has also produced a number of copy-cat versions. West Coast, for example, has adopted this season elements of Malthouse's forward press that has helped take it from last place to a preliminary final.

But regardless of his success with Collingwood, Malthouse's brilliance as a tactician and tutor can be seen in opposing coaches' boxes around the AFL.

The list of graduates from the Malthouse school of coaching to move on to senior jobs elsewhere runs deep throughout the AFL. Dean Laidley, Brad Scott, Guy McKenna, Mark Neeld and of course Nathan Buckley all completed coaching apprenticeships under Malthouse, before taking the reins at a club of their own.

Add in John Worsford - arguably the coach of the year for 2011 due to his amazing transformation at West Coast - and there's yet another graduate of Academy Malthouse. Another of his captains, Scott Burns, has emerged as hot property on the coaching market, so expect another addition to be made to that roll-call in the near future.

In contrast to the countless column centimetres devoted to Malthouse's coaching future beyond the current campaign, by all accounts from those who matter, Saturday will be the final time he leads a team into the fray.

It's hard not to feel that it's fitting - although Hawthorn fans and the Collingwood-hating factions of the football public may disagree - that the curtain will fall on one of the most influential coaching figures in history, on the grandest stage our game has to offer.

Yet, while Saturday will see the end of an era in many ways for the AFL, Malthouse's legacy will continue to live on long after the final siren sounds. 

MALTHOUSE v CHRIS SCOTT
              Master v Apprentice

Age:                        58       35
Games coached: 662      24
Finals coached:    51         2
Premierships:         3         0
Grand Finals:          7         0
First season:     1984    2011