NHL Rumors: Toronto Maple Leafs to Announce Goalie Coach Francois Allaire Will not Return

For some fans of the Toronto Maple Leafs, it has been a long time coming.

According to Renaud Lavoie of the French broadcast network RDS, it appears as though the Toronto Maple Leafs will announce at some point today that goaltending coach Francois Allaire will not be returning to the club.

Allaire wasn’t exactly shy about his decision not to return, either.

In a phone interview this morning, Allaire left no stone unturned, leaving his displeasure with the way the Leafs handled their goalies plain for all to see.

When pressed about why he had decided to leave Toronto behind, Allaire responded by saying, “To be honest, I don’t think the Leafs need a goalie coach…They have two or three guys who were making decisions with the goalies. In the NHL, that’s not the way it works. If that’s the way they want to operate, then I’m not there.”

He also said that he didn’t feel like he was able to do his job last season as his ice time was limited and there were too many people trying to work with Toronto’s netminders.

Regarding the goalies themselves, Allaire said there were no problems when it came to listening or communication, making it fairly clear that the issue was with the rest of the coaching staff and the way the team was managed.

Allaire, dubbed by many as the guru of goaltending around the hockey world, was brought in three years ago by GM Brian Burke, who worked with Allaire in Anaheim, where they won a Stanley Cup together.

Unfortunately for Allaire, he was never able to turn Toronto’s goaltending woes around and found himself out of favor with a majority of Leafs fans by the end of this past season.

Now the search begins for someone to take over once the NHL lockout comes to an end.

According to Allaire, the Leafs may not need to look very far.