Our next head coach

Who should be the head coach in 2026?

  • Blake Green

    Votes: 5 5.9%

  • Brian McDermott

    Votes: 14 16.5%

  • Brad Arthur

    Votes: 13 15.3%

  • Willie Peters

    Votes: 40 47.1%

  • John Morris

    Votes: 18 21.2%

  • Justin Holbrook

    Votes: 42 49.4%

  • Des Hasler

    Votes: 1 1.2%

  • Sam Burgess

    Votes: 1 1.2%

  • Billy Slater

    Votes: 6 7.1%

  • Other (name below)

    Votes: 1 1.2%
  • Total voters
    85
The more I hear of Michael Cheika as a option, the worse I think of it.

Screams Alan Jones at Balmain vibes and seems the type of guy that tells you how great he is rather than how he's actually going to rebuild our club and instead leave it in a worse place.

If the Knights are fair dinkum, Justin Holbrook or John Morris is the next head coach.
 
We just have to hope the committee doesn’t get sold a solution rather than a legitimate solution. But I like they are going through due diligence. Obviously super critical decision that should not be rushed.
 
frankLauda said:
We just have to hope the committee doesn’t get sold a solution rather than a legitimate solution. But I like they are going through due diligence. Obviously super critical decision that should not be rushed.
Click to expand...
At least we are conducting due process unlike the Titans. They sacked Holbrook and rolled out Des, sacked Des and rolled out Hannay. Never a real process conducted. Doesn't end well.
 
Timana Tahu on "over the black dot" on SBS was very critical of the club culture in recent years.
He didn't name names or become very specific, but said there was no feeling of club spirit and club pride (trying to paraphrase his very non-specific criticisms). Anyway - the question put to him was would the Knights be big improvers next year? and his answer was "no".
 
1757665619939.jpeg
 
Billy said:
Timana Tahu on "over the black dot" on SBS was very critical of the club culture in recent years.
He didn't name names or become very specific, but said there was no feeling of club spirit and club pride (trying to paraphrase his very non-specific criticisms). Anyway - the question put to him was would the Knights be big improvers next year? and his answer was "no".
Click to expand...
Respect Timana legend. But he doesn’t know who’s going to be in the building to make that call. Plus Parr and POS relatively new to the organisation.
 
I heard on the radio that they were very impressed with Dean Young in his interview.

James Graham went on to say how impressed he was with Young and how his coaching helped him when he was at the Dragons. They all talked him up and said he would be a good fit at Newcastle. Now i know the media have their agenda’s but I found it interesting

Seems like it might be between Holbrook and Young

Holbrook did ok at the Titans and was sacked unfairly IMO He will definitely improve our attack, but I’m not sure if he would improve our commitment to each other, the club and the fans. Im not sure if that’s in his personality to do that

Young I don’t know enough about. I know he’s been at a few clubs as an assistant and was the Dragons interim coach when they sacked McGregor. Im not sure how he would go with game plans etc but I get the feeling he would be a bit like Jason Ryles, in that he would demand the players show commitment to each other, the club and the fans

I think Young might be the type of coach we need, someone who will put pride back in the jersey. IMO putting pride back is an important first step in turning this club around. Once you get pride in their performances everything else starts to follow, players care more for each other, care about their own performances etc
 
Attacking structures and tactics is 100% our number one issue. But I can see how when we play such a robotic, braindead style of play, it looks like we’re lacking pride. Don’t think that’s the case though (apart from the final few weeks).
 
Even this Knights culture stuff is a bit of a joke. For the first 5-6 years or so pre-joey we were a hardworking side that didn't score many points, then for the next 12 or so we were a side that said we don't care how many you score we'll score more, then for the last 20 years (the majority of our history) the identity has pretty much been "we're bad".
 
The Panthers were notorious for their questionable culture until 2020 when they became obviously the club with the best culture in the comp. Did the culture change overnight or did something notable happen on the field?

The numbers don’t lie on the impact of Reece Walsh, if he played all 24 games Brisbane would easily make top four and if he missed the whole season they’d not get near the top 8. I guess it must be that he’s important to the culture.

If a coach gets the best out of Brown, Sharpe and Ponga rather than implementing a playing style which doesn’t suit the players we have, I anticipate a similar mysterious, rapid improvement in the culture.
 
HarVeeGee13 said:
We can’t ****ing score points lol. Hate to be reductive but there was nothing that went wrong this year that wouldn’t have been instantly fixed if we could score some points.
Click to expand...
Which was my point with Gagai the other day. 2 tries for a centre in a year is so bad. He needs to hit holes himself more regularly and alas I think he’s past that. Lucas scored more in one game. Best was barely better tbf
 
slotmachine said:
The fact an elite rep level centre also had a poor year in attack surely suggests some fundamental issues at play rather than just "gags bad"
Click to expand...
Id agree with that except for the fact we have Lucas and Sharpe able to get themselves through the line regularly and score. Yes we were so poor in attack it’s not funny but Gags and Best if the were as great as we think they’d make breaks.
 
Look I love the *idea* of having four dynamic ball runners in the spine as much as anyone, but there’s a reason Chad Townsend wasn’t that far shy of 300 NRL games. Jamal Fogarty is arguably Canberra’s most important player. It’s not because of how much fear they strike into a defensive line…
 
Beatell said:
Id agree with that except for the fact we have Lucas and Sharpe able to get themselves through the line regularly and score. Yes we were so poor in attack it’s not funny but Gags and Best if the were as great as we think they’d make breaks.
Click to expand...
Don’t read this as me blaming Sharpe - I blame AOB - but having Fletcher on his inside for a lot of the season instead of Hastings or even Crossland is the reason for this.
 
HarVeeGee13 said:
Don’t read this as me blaming Sharpe - I blame AOB - but having Fletcher on his inside for a lot of the season instead of Hastings or even Crossland is the reason for this.
Click to expand...
Yeah that’s fair. I guess I’m just putting forward I expect those two to regularly be able to beat defenders one on one good ball or not. Gags stats come from him bouncing off players and going sideways a lot. For me Sharpe into centre Gags to the wing as a finishers and solid at the back Marz to reserves Smith to 7. But if we keep Smith at 9 like has been discussed I can see Crossland working at 9 a lot and releasing Smith to ball play especially on the right.
 
HarVeeGee13 said:
Don’t read this as me blaming Sharpe - I blame AOB - but having Fletcher on his inside for a lot of the season instead of Hastings or even Crossland is the reason for this.
Click to expand...
For Gagai? Sharpe played left most of the season, only had a couple of games on the right before he got injured. Cogger was probably more of an issue for Gags not getting much attacking ball.
 
Was only talking about Best - who still had 12 line breaks in 18 games, which is twice as many as Seb Kris, who played 22 games. I understand it’s disappointing when he was a 13 tries, 16 try assists player in 2023 when we were really good. But he still went good this year despite rarely getting effective ball.

I think Gagai led the team in line break assists though and how many times was a try on his outside squandered by his winger getting something basic wrong?

I dunno either way I don’t accept the premise that the centres were a significant failure point for the attack. I’m definitely not arguing Cogger had a great season. Though our best games in attack were when we basically totally abandoned playing Kalyn & Fletcher off each other, and went away from Kalyn as the lead playmaker through the middle third…Cogger okay in those games…
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top