THE restructured Western Bulldogs coaching panel will be overseen by a new football manager, leaving coach Rodney Eade to focus solely on the team after a disastrous year.

Club president David Smorgon said Eade would no longer be head of football, as the club set about reversing the trend of flourishing under new coaches before slipping out of finals contention.

A detailed review of the club's on-field performance this year found the football department was bordering on "dysfunctional" in the second half of this season, forcing sweeping changes ahead of 2008.

"Clearly over the last eight weeks of the season we fell off the rails … we lost the last seven games by an average of 10 goals," Smorgon said.

Eade, who is overseas, will return to a diminished role and report directly to the new general manager of football, who is expected to be appointed before Christmas.

"We didn't want to just sack the coach, we really needed to understand what was going on," Smorgon said.

The five-week review began after the club's final game and included internal surveys and interviews with players, coaches, members of the football department and board members.

After finishing ninth in his first season as coach, Eade guided the Bulldogs to the finals in 2006, but tension within the football department peaked in the second half of this year.

"Frankly, over the course of the year there were things going on in the football department that we (the board) were not comfortable with," Smorgon said. "I'm not making excuses, but things were out of control."

Assistant coach Chris Bond (widely tipped for a senior job in the recent coaching merry-go round) has joined Fremantle's coaching panel, Sean Wellman has gone to Melbourne, Matthew Drain has been appointed head of football at St Kilda and development coach Jason Mifsud has been replaced by Brad Gotch.

The Dogs have also appointed former Carlton defender Peter Dean as back-line coach and elevated Wayne Campbell to a full-time assistant role, while Leon Cameron has stayed on as an assistant coach.

After the shock of slipping to 13th this season "something was clearly wrong", Smorgon said, adding the review highlighted a communication breakdown in the football department.

"There was clear evidence that as the pressure came from losing game after game, people started pointing fingers at each other and started to blame each other instead of working together," he said. "We gave a lot of responsibility to Rodney, as head of football, and it's clear based on the evidence there was a lot of things we asked Rodney to do that he's not capable of doing.

"That's not a criticism of him, it's more of a statement that perhaps we got it wrong when he put up his hand for that role."

Chief executive Campbell Rose will also take a hands-on role in the revamped football department.

Smorgon, who is seeking re-appointment until the end of 2010, said the new general manager of football would be responsible for a $13 million budget. He added there was no animosity between Eade or himself following "some deep and meaningful discussions" and the coach had accepted "100 per cent" the changes to his role. "It's been a difficult few weeks, but we've put it behind us and we're moving on," he said.

As a direct result of the review the club will also appoint an outside company to run a leadership program, similar to that undertaken by Geelong this season.

Smorgon said the club, which had formed a new alliance with VFL team Williamstown, also had to improve in the area of player development.