mozza91
Coach
- Messages
- 15,481
You’re not wrong. I thought it was Steve Burraston who insisted on the buy back.The whole period (lets be honest, the last 20 years) is just one terrifying fever dream. You can be excused for mixing people up.
You’re not wrong. I thought it was Steve Burraston who insisted on the buy back.The whole period (lets be honest, the last 20 years) is just one terrifying fever dream. You can be excused for mixing people up.
I sense that most professional sports clubs (95%) are like this and probably 90% of NRL clubs and also that you can still win premierships with a bit of luck even though it is like this.It was Robbie Tew who insisted on the buy back.
Matt Gidley was the CEO between Tinkler and Wests. The poor bloke aged 10 years in 2 and f**ked off to run McDonalds franchises instead so he could work with a higher standard of team member.
I have had a little bit to do with the club over the years as both head of the supporters club and a minor sponsor - from the mid 2000s to date.
It has always been amateur hour to say the least.
The constant staff turn over at all levels means there was close to zero corporate knowledge in the joint at any one time. Just a revolving door of (at first) enthusiastic people thrown into roles with either little support or little capacity (or both) and then they leave quickly when they realise they can't do the job.
I could write an essay on the joint, but tldr - its a bin fire, and always has been. Needs a full re-set. Hopefully yet another CEO can turn it around.
At least the new COE is quite nice - a lot better than the former squash courts we used to squat in. When I went there last half the rooms still weren't furnished though.
You’re not wrong. I thought it was Steve Burraston who insisted on the buy back.
I sense that most professional sports clubs (95%) are like this and probably 90% of NRL clubs and also that you can still win premierships with a bit of luck even though it is like this.
What's the highest number of pathways guys you've fielded in a game this year? Four?
And yeah I know the Dogs are going really good right now but it's overwhelmingly on the back of a really good run of recruiting. Gus deserves a pat on the back for that.We are rebuilding our juniors. You will see that happen in the next few seasons when guys we brought in are replaced.
And how it that working out for you? Are you guys keeping the right ones?
And yeah I know the Dogs are going really good right now but it's overwhelmingly on the back of a really good run of recruiting. Gus deserves a pat on the back for that.
But you can't buy a team and then give yourself a pat on the back for pathways guys who've shown nothing in first grade yet though. Seriously turn it up. Many of them simply guys who aren't getting chances because Gus keeps signing guys over the top of them, or moving good players like Paul Alamoti and Jake Averillo on to fit them in. I guess because these allegedly great pathways aren't producing good enough players.
We are rebuilding our juniors. You will see that happen in the next few seasons when guys we brought in are replaced.
And how it that working out for you? Are you guys keeping the right ones?
Kind of not that different then, before Wests took over the way that pathways worked was overhauled so many times (before you even factor in the lack of money). Knights fans give Wayne Bennett a lot of crap for saddling the club with an old & overpaid roster, but what they should be mad about was his approach to juniors. He was basically given carte blanche to run everything at the club the way he liked and his brainchild was an "elite pathways" model where basically the club just decided on the 14 year olds they liked best and then this quite small squad of kids would train together year on year and then theoretically you'd have this great squad ready to go in 4-8 years.
The problem is that you get guys who look like future immortals at 14 and don't get much better, but you also get guys like Dylan Lucas who were nowhere till age 18 and just keep getting better and better. You literally can't predict who'll be good as adults so you need to cast as wide a net as possible. This is one of the things Wests had to contend with when they came in, the club was literally telling talented young kids from the region to look elsewhere because they already had a player in their position in the "elite pathways" squad. That put heaps of noses out of joint and was yet another reason why local clubs would legitimately tell kids from broader region to avoid the Knights like the plague and try to get into a different system.
The best player to come out of said squad, by the way? Probably Jack Cogger. Thanks Wayne! Stick to coaching.