The controversial issue of AFL players using caffeine on Wednesday sparked a public feud between rival coaches Chris Connolly and Terry Wallace.

Fremantle's Connolly accused Wallace of self-promotion after the Richmond coach on Tuesday expressed his concern at AFL players taking caffeine tablets.

Wallace returned fire on Wednesday night on the Fox Footy Channel, saying Connolly had broken a pact between the 16 AFL coaches not to publicly criticise each other.

"There goes the coaches' association edict - we met about seven weeks ago and we sort-of thought it was in the best interests of all of us in the coaches's association that we weren't having chips at each other publicly," Wallace said.

"That's gone out the door pretty quickly.

"Look, we all have our opinions, my opinion obviously was different to Chris's, but I'm quite surprised by the personal attack."

Wallace also took exception to Connolly's claim on Wednesday that "when Terry coached the Western Bulldogs he had blokes running around bashing blokes".

"Did that help promote the game?"

Wallace replied: "I've never sent a player out to intentionally go out and whack somebody ever in my life, so that's where I sit.

"I have no idea why Chris would be wanting to make things personal between us two, I certainly don't have any grudges against him."

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