SMH Why the Wests Tigers need to stop blaming coach Michael Maguire
April 27, 2021 — 6.00am
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/nrl/wh...ng-coach-michael-maguire-20210426-p57mi0.html
Well, of course it’s all Michael Maguire’s fault. When isn’t the coach to blame at the Wests Tigers?
Have you seen our players?
Tim Sheens. Mick Potter. Jason Taylor. Ivan Cleary. Now Maguire after the Tigers’ diabolical 1-6 start to the season.
Ivan left us you f**kwit.
At what point does chief executive Justin Pascoe, chairman Lee Hagipantelis and the rest of the board start taking ownership and accepting blame for the club stumbling about the NRL competition like the drunkest man at the party?
Fair point.
Is this club ever going to get it together?
No.
The problem with joint ventures, much like St George Illawarra, is they’re as united as the Brady Bunch when the team is winning. When it is not, they leak like a waterfall and stab each other in the back.
the problem at every club you scrote sucking knob
Perhaps the greatest indication of what Maguire is up against is the leaking from within the club of a get-out clause in his recent contract extension, which was signed in December last year and takes him through to the end of 2023.
they got that right based on his record
It’s been presented as outstanding management from the club; that it can sack Maguire if it wants and only pay him a paltry sum.
Thank God for that.
In reality, as confirmed by three separate sources, it’s a standard termination clause found in most contracts, in all forms of business and in most coach contracts these days.
Have you seen most contracts you tool? If not, you’re guessing.
To sell it as smart management is signature arse-covering for a club that’s had to cover its arse quite a lot of over the past decade. It reeks of something out of the Broncos’ playbook last year with Anthony Seibold.
It was a good idea. Look at his poor coaching results. The Broncs used it to dump seibs. It helped them.
Maguire isn’t without fault in the way things are developing at the Tigers – we’ll get to that in a minute – but it’s near impossible to coach a side when there’s so much chatter coming from above, whether it’s public or not.
How would you know? Have you coached at nrl level you wanker?
You can set your clock to when the Tigers are playing the Panthers because you can guarantee Pascoe will make a comment about how Cleary disrespected and walked out on the club, stuffing up the salary cap.
And that’s the only thing Pascoe would be right about you f**king muppet.
As for Hagipantelis, he’s on speed dial for every almost every reporter in the business because he always talks. (That said, he didn’t return this columnist’s call on Monday to answer some hard questions).
Dont be offended, I wouldn’t take your call either.
Earlier this month, Hagipantelis let go with a stream of consciousness about besieged halfback Luke Brooks, saying he “will not partake in that narrative whatsoever” before partaking in an extraordinary narrative about Brooks and his future and what people are saying about him and what the club thinks of him …
Changed his mind, so what?
The smart chairs know when to shut up. Hagipantelis doesn’t have an off switch.
Provide an example f**kface?
In fairness, he’s only been chairman since November 2019.
lol the irony you merkin
Pascoe has been chief executive for just under six years. Sure, he cops it from angry members via social media and email, but he’s a darling of most league roundsmen/women and has barely been fingered for the malaise that’s infected this great club.
Half his f**king luck.
The Tigers have so much going for them, not least a $75 million centre of excellence and platoons of resources the NRL team has never really had. But the team hasn’t soared whatsoever on his watch.
Sure, but how is that his fault ? Link it.
The problem at the Tigers is their roster, pure and simple, and for that a whole stack of people need to take responsibility.
No kidding?
The abject lack of experience explains why they are drifting in and out of matches; why they can trail the Cowboys 28-6 at halftime, then come screaming back into it in the second; why they can appear to have Manly’s measure for 20-or-so minutes then fold like a cheap suit for the remaining 60.
Nice cliche you piece of shit
Consider their spine.
I have already.
Fullback Daine Laurie, 21, has played 10 matches. Hooker Jake Simpkin, 19, just two. Five-eighth Adam Doueihi has played 56 matches but is also just 22 and still finding his feet in the halves.
and your point?
Maguire facing the axe as pressure mounts at Wests Tigers
Then there’s Brooks, 26, who has played 155 matches but hasn’t developed into the playmaker many of us expected after watching him carve up the Dragons on debut at the SCG all those years ago.
Roster management is about keeping the players you want. The best clubs do it with shrewd aplomb.
They have good coaches merkin.
The Tigers will be eternally paying the price for letting the best player in the game, James Tedesco, walk out and join the Roosters.
He was a greedy arrogant ungrateful flog
Because it’s so painfully clear this side is in desperate need of a superstar. Or half a superstar. But which superstar would want to join the Tigers unless it’s on enormous money?
None of the top sides have just one superstar. They all have good coaches too.
Instead, the Tigers have had to recruit whoever they can get and this is where Maguire must shoulder some of the responsibility.
Rubbish.
James Roberts was signed on very little money. So were BJ and Luciano Leilua.
The problem is they are completely not Maguire-style players, only sometimes seeming interested.
Lucy is a gun player you idiot. Dont you watch games?
Players like Corey Thompson and Paul Momirovski are Maguire-style players, ripping in at training and never giving up in matches, yet they are no longer at the club.
thank God, they’ve done f**k all since leaving.
Interestingly, the former players I spoke to on Monday thought these types of departures have hurt the club more than that of Benji Marshall.
name them you moof
It’s too simplistic to say Maguire and the Tigers got it wrong with Marshall. He’s revelling in a well-established team at Souths, surrounded with international- and Origin-standard players, having been given a roving commission to do whatever he wants.
Bullshit.
What Maguire did miscalculate was the fallout that came when he dropped Marshall early last season. The veteran playmaker was one of his biggest allies. It didn’t take long for the sentiment to swing the other way.
Selecting a side is not a popularity contest.
The other criticism of Maguire is he can only “coach one way”. In other words, with the intensity of an SAS officer, not happy until someone or all them are vomiting lactic acid.
It hasn’t worked.
To be honest, that’s a copout – something that’s also been acknowledged by former players.
Nope.
Because what they notice from some members of this Tigers squad is that some care deeply about the result (like Doueihi who was in tears after the Cowboys’ loss), and others (like the ones who are posting on Instagram less than an hour after another defeat) do not.
lol, Married at first sight.
Those who can’t dance blame it on the music. Too often at the Wests Tigers, players who don’t care enough and officials who aren’t doing their job, blame it on the coach.
He can’t coach you idiot. His results are f**ked.
If Michael Maguire goes, will life be any different under the next poor soul who comes along?
We will soon find out. Should he have a job for life?
Andrew Webster is Chief Sports Writer of The Sydney Morning Herald.
