Verbeek has departed less than a year into his two-year contract – he returned to his native Holland amid the league’s suspension and won’t return.

United chairman Piet van der Pol says the Reds have little choice but to seek an Australian as their next coach.

“It’s more likely that we will be looking at an Australian coach at the moment because travel restrictions are in place,” van der Pol said on Thursday.

“So practically it would be difficult to find a foreign coach.

“And it’s our philosophy to be an Australian club and start from there.”

Carl Veart will be Adelaide’s interim coach should the league resume competition.

Five rounds, and finals, remain but there is no certainty of the league finishing because of the coronavirus.

Before the shutdown, finals were scheduled to start this weekend with the grand final due on May 16 or May 17.

“If you start a competition you want to know who is the best …so ideally you would finish it,” van der Pol said.

“But how long can you wait?

“We are waiting for news on resuming the current competition, that is step one.

“Step two is, what is next year, what will that be looking like? Are we going to start in October as usual, will we be starting later?

“We don’t know yet … it’s up to the FFA to work some things out.

-AAP

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