Where to start?
On field things to start with and will probably add more stuff later......
Why things turned out like they did: Karl Harrison and Lee Greenwood - They lost the dressing room very early and probably lost most of the fans 2 years back. Im trying not to be too harsh because KH will always be regarded as a Fax legend for his playing days IMO but there were complaints about the two main coaches all the way up from senior players right through to the U20's and down to college kids that had coaching from one or both of them. The board did not listen and as a result we are where we are now.
Very few players have shown any sort of improvement under the coaching regime and it were quite visible that some players went backwards. It was a recipe for disaster from the start. The funny thing was though it was hard not to like Karl and I think that is why it went on as much as it did and if you take out the bollockings that he administered every game he could talk the club up and could talk players in to signing for the club, I mean the signings for the coming season all look promising and they are all his. Maybe he could have done a job 'upstairs' for the club but with the money situation that could not happen.
One of his biggest problems this season same as last was not been able to replace Penky and his poor decision in replacing Thackery. Maybe that was out of his hands as soon as Finn asked for a release but it certainly didnt help the cause. His complaints through the season before about how he had players with a slow passing movement, Im not quite sure how he thought signing Kaye and Mennell would rectify that. It probably also didnt help him that he still didnt want to believe that we were better with Holden on the pitch rather than either of his first choice hookers.
Harping back to the improvement thing and i think Morrison nailed it in his interview where he mentioned about happy players are always better players and although I think the group is tight nit Im not sure they were happy at all in the things they did in training or the things they were asked to do in a game. You only have to look at players like Thackery and even Barlow who look like twice the players they were at Fax and that has got to come down in a big part to the coach.
When it comes to picking the coach the reality is there wont be too many people who either fancy it or who will be suitable. There seems to be a couple of names been mentioned on different forums, one imo would almost be like for like, a coach who can do a job for a season but then the club goes stale, or a young coach learning his trade under a top quality coach at a good SL club. From what I have heard about the young coach he seems to be very keen, technically seems to have a lot of fresh ideas and will not be the sort to lambast the players after every single mistake and may even be able to compliment the players when they do something well. Its a no brainer for me but it looks like there are still some people yet to be interviewed so the best candidate could still be out there.
