Bringing Watmough was one of the dumbest things he has done since being our coach and I and others here stated it at the time and we were right.
I also wasn't very happy about Scott for similar reasons of age and injury issues at his age. Now at least we have gotten some decent games out of Scott, but still for the coin and what he was brought here to do, I feel overall he has been an average signing. But not the disaster Watmough turned out to be.
There are always great leaders around at other clubs that can be brought in that would of done better jobs then either of those two. I know your first question will now be who? But I don't remember who was around at the time we signed them two so I can't give you an example.
But just look at the Dragons this year. They pounced on James Graham and even have the Dogs paying from what I heard most of his 900k salary. Now that's an awesome pickup. A high profile individual that is constantly in demand by the media(free exposure for your club), leader on and off the field, no nonsense charismatic and liked by most fans of the NRL.
Also on that, when he retires, and if he stays in Oz, he will probably have a job in the media. He will be another media personality that will be aligned with both the Dogs and Saints. All we have is Sterlo from 30 years ago, who is good at his job, but you would never know he is a former Parra boy, and the buffoon Hindy, that no one takes seriously.
I heard a story on one of the NRL shows a few weeks ago, that during the off season on their training runs. Graham was busting a gut as he normally does and two of the other forwards who admire and look up to him(apparently they all do) didn't want to be seen as weak and wanted to impress and in doing so broke their personal best records. Now that is the sort of thing you want from a leader.
Not Watmough, who by his own words would keep to himself and after training would rush off home.
There are always leaders in the game that you can get to your club that can change the attitude of the younger boneheads. But the coach has to be able to identify and then attract them to the club. So far as I'm concerned BA has done a pretty piss poor job of that so far.
