Re: Yet another gone : Mon Sep 16, 2013 10:12 pm  

mate not having a go at any supporters, just saying committed aussie being an oxymoron, don't get me wrong was great to have Jamie here for the short time he was here, but putting him down as "THE" committed one! we have had several in the past that have put a heck of a lot more in to the club Chad being one mentioned
Good luck to Mr Soward back in the NRL

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 6:45 am  

but it is just as much down to Powell and Rea

Interesting that you leave Mac of that list

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 10:23 am  

I think if you looked at Mac's reign which was around four and a half years, you'd observe that he had two fine spells.

The first was in the second half of the 2006 season where we experienced a series of very narrow wins and finished 7th. In that he looked promising as a coach and perhaps had the strongest squad in his reign. He looked like he would be very useful.

However, once he started to bring in his own selected players we pretty much declined, going from 7th to 9th then 9th again and that was in a league with only 12 teams.

The second good spell was in 2009 when we rose to fourth place, though were slightly flattered by the four early games against newly promoted Salford and Crusaders. We won away at Leeds and Hull KR, but that was pretty much it for Mac, with just 1 more win from about half a season.

The following season we pretty much bottomed out with only 6 wins and Mac moved on.

I would suggest that the cupboard in terms of talent was pretty much bare when Mac left, because he had adopted a policy of trying to squeeze one or two extra years out of declining veterans and supplemented it by signing more from Australia and youth castoffs from Leeds and Bradford.

He also did not act to get youngsters on relatively long contracts and a succession of players were tapped up, something I see he is beginning to reoccur at Leeds, although he has at least signed up the first team youngsters this time.

He also had quite a few walkouts, non-arrivals or players who couldn't play over the years which reduced his talent such as Haumono, Villasanti, Fa'afili, Robinson, Wells, Faumunia and James, so he was a bit unlucky but also not pragmatic. The frustrating thing was the policy of seemingly auto-renewing contracts regardless of appearance record, injury record and form.

I think if you look at both Mac and Powell, they did not get value for money from a talent point of view and also squandered players who were better than they went on to sign.

But Tony Rea has only made three signings - Jamie Soward, Tommy Lee and Alex Hurst and he's allowed an army of veterans to go which I reckon Mac and Powell would have retained.

So I don't see how Tony can be tarred with the same brush; once he has made signings then he can be judged.

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 12:17 pm  

Mark I always respect your opinion on here but I do have to disagree a bit on Tony Rea. The bit about coaches having not being judged until they have the squad that they wanted with signings that they make has some merit as a coach will want a certain style of play and players to suit that.
But the bottom line is that a coach's main responsibility is to get the best out of the players that he has. I am certainly not saying that we had a great squad but clearly Tony wasn't able to get the vast majority of the squad to play anywhere near their ability otherwise we would have had a better season than we did.
In my opinion it was a bad decision to appoint Tony to the full-time role and nothing he has done since that time has given me any reason to change that opinion.

If the club get another "fresh start" and keep Tony Rea as the coach then I think it will be a very short lived fresh start. Although to be honest I cant see where they are going to get enough players to give any coach much of a chance of success.

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 2:56 pm  

I reckon Tony Rea could put a better squad together than Brian Mac or Powell with half of the money they had to spend.

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 3:12 pm  

Tre Cool wrote:

I reckon Tony Rea could put a better squad together than Brian Mac or Powell with half of the money they had to spend.

Maybe so, he certainly left a decent one for Mac to inherit.

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 3:28 pm  

Claimed today that Wigan have agreed a fee? for Clubb, wonder how much, and how many transfer fees we have received for players?

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 3:41 pm  

jaybs wrote:

Claimed today that Wigan have agreed a fee? for Clubb, wonder how much, and how many transfer fees we have received for players?

More sympathy purchases from Lenagan?? Maybe he feels guilty. Quite like Clubb but not gonna add much to their squad and as for Sarginson....

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 4:04 pm  

I am amazed that Clubb has gone to Wigan, he had clearly gone past his sell by date here. I will watch his and Sargy's career wish interest. He will get a warm! welcome if he makes it to the Hive!

Re: Yet another gone : Tue Sep 17, 2013 4:36 pm  

poplar panther wrote:

I am amazed that Clubb has gone to Wigan, he had clearly gone past his sell by date here. I will watch his and Sargy's career wish interest. He will get a warm! welcome if he makes it to the Hive!

Id like to see Clubby do well, its good for the game and for us for our products to succeed. I think LMS is one of the most under-rated players in SL.