Yes I watched Coote, he had fantastic runs of form for Penrith. The nines made everyone think Bevan French and that Kata guy were future stars so forgive me for disregarding that.
Did Mansour ask for a release? Dallin wanted out, he asked for a release. Multiple coaches gave him a shot at fullback and decided he wasn't the one, I was disappointed by this too but he had every chance and wasn't good enough.
2x average coaches without a premiership thought he wasnt good enough... supposedly.
Yet Michael Maguire a premiership winning international coach thought he was good enough to captain his country at fullback based on his form for us and went hard for him at Tigers based on his form for NZ.
Dean Pay is an average unproven coach... but also thought he was good enough to be fullback for his club. That makes multiple coaches who DID think he was good enough too.
The 9s showed how Cowboys had improved arguably his biggest flaw with us. His pace. The competition meant little. But going on to win a premiership at Cowboys wasnt bad. Nor were his 17 try assists. He just looked like a more evolved version of whay he was for us.
Conditioning is clearly an issue under Ivan. That little bit of improved fitness and speed can make a huge difference to players. I liked Ivan before his return too. But excuses were made his first time around that I bought into and many of those are repeating themselves.
Ivan is great with average players who make it on effort alone. They likely cimpensate themselves for whatever fitness areas Ivan is lacking in.
He is great with rookies who likely put in extra effort to force their way into the NRL.
I think he is also good with guys looking for a bit of redemption (ie. Soward, Idris etc.)
He just seems better with guys who have other reasons to play harder. Seemingly they train harder without his input.
The odd thing is his discipline seems shit or low priority yet his son is arguably the hardest working player in the competition. Or right up there atleast. He puts in 100% for 80 minutes. His intensity on both sides of the ball is high. People mock pointing out his efforts (in Origin especially). But in the context of where Ivan seems to lack as a coach it's really odd his son excels in those areas.
Anyways im done arguing it. I was making a joke about Ivan developing premiership winners by letting them go. Then you argued with me using the term superstars and then decided I was calling them duds. When my real criticism is players get worse in general when he arrives and get better when they / he leaves. Not always. Some thrive undet him. But that list is shorter