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
mozza said:
Having Lucas, Brown and Ponga feeding him will certainly help Best get some space. McEwen, Smith, Sharpe could give Gags plenty of opportunities too.
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I agree, what goes on through the middle should suit our centres next year.
 
Owey said:
I agree, what goes on through the middle should suit our centres next year.
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It’s essentially a new team next year so it might take abit of time. There’s plenty of talent to work with but not a lot of depth. Hope the new coach can take advantage of it.
 
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Chaister said:
Thank god someone said it. I was like wtf am i even reading lol
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Our whole team was the problem. I didn’t say they were the problem, a good club it’s highest paid players play to their potential ours didn’t. Young players like I said Lucas and Sharpe made our senior player look poor. Elite or quality centres make their own breaks and tries ours didn’t this year. In fairness there’s so many fingers to be pointed at the whole team. I just started with I don’t see Gags being the centre we need anymore he needs to play wing.
 
Agreed it’s time to decide who plays right centre after 26, that will depend on 6 & 7, possibly Brown and Smith so it’s more likely Gags wing, Sharpe centre meaning Young to left wing.
Best will be so much better with a stronger spine and Lucas inside and Young outside, no taking from McEwen who did well but a season to further develop and strengthen his not so good areas.
If Props are ready, JSaf, Saulo, Crouch etc then Frizell can go back to right side and still be available for prop if needed.
Assuming all fit and ready to go then new coach should have a strong squad for Rd1 with 1 Ponga, 2 Gags, 3 Sharpe, 4 Best, 5 Young, 6 Brown, 7 Smith, 8 JSaf, 9 Crossland, 10 Saulo, 11 Lucas, 12 Frizell, 13 Croker, 14 Arthur?, 15 Mooney, 16 Crouch, 17 Jones.
Weakness 14 Arthur not quite ready but Crossland plays most of 80 minutes at 9 with Arthur limited minutes, alternative is Gamble at 14, my preferred.
 
I really don't see centre as Sharpe's position. And I think it is a complete waste playing him on the wing. I'm a bit unsure as to why the shiny new toy has jumped Sharpe in everyone's thinking, but eh, it will be down to the coach. I'm happy if his efforts push Sharpe out wider.

Having said all that, I'm not against Gags moving to the wing and finding a new right centre. I'd leave Young on the right and let Gagai use his right foot step in yardage like he did at Souths though.
 
We do need to start running younger guys in positions. It's time for friz and gags to take a backseat and be nurturing their health and helping the next gen come through. For what it's worth gags has always been a worker and never really all that talented or big enough. He is a luai of the centre mould, jumps around, doesn't really know what his doing, finds a gap then pounces.
Friz made it from his athleticism (workrate) and strength, never really been deceptive or hole runner kinda guy. Modern day footy players especially out wide need to be able to understand a line run, ball play, being deceptive and effective. Ala Lucas.
 
Owey said:
I really don't see centre as Sharpe's position. And I think it is a complete waste playing him on the wing. I'm a bit unsure as to why the shiny new toy has jumped Sharpe in everyone's thinking, but eh, it will be down to the coach. I'm happy if his efforts push Sharpe out wider.
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I think he's a great footy player. I also think he's a terrible half on what we've seen so far. Not just "inexperienced" terrible, more like "I can't believe they thought this was a good idea" terrible. I've watched a fair few of our games back and I think having him there introduced a lot of issues with our set plays. I also think the way they tried to ease him in where he'd get into fullback like positions outside Kalyn also caused issues because I also think Kalyn really struggled with the finer points of playing in that first layer in shape work. And the dude is a theoretical general play kicker at best and I'm just not sure how that aspect is supposed to work, like is Ponga going to do almost all of it?

Please don't take this as me having a go at you because it's not, but I've seen lots of people suggest that Sharpe can transition not just to 6, but halfback, and I am honestly flabbergasted as to what anyone could have possibly seen to convince them. I know it was supposed to have looked good at training, but South Sydney were happy to let Adam Reynolds walk because Lachlan Ilias looks like a generational talent in training - real games are when things are stress tested.

It's not boredom, it's not excitement about the new shiny toy. It's actively not wanting Sharpe in the halves. If we didn't sign Sandon Smith I would be picking Gamble or even Cogger over Sharpe as Brown's halves partner. Yes, really. I think Kalyn plays his best footy with two genuine halves inside him and I don't foresee Sharpe developing into one any time soon.

I know I kind of got on your nerves a little bit when I read a bit much in to your comments about us developing a "Melbourne-style" attack, but I sincerely think, whatever our version of it looks like - I get that the idea isn't just to directly copy what they do - it won't work. I think there's a reason most clubs don't do that. And I think there will be coaches who tell them that, that their answer to getting the best out of Ponga/Brown/Sharpe is to play Sharpe elsewhere in the backline. I hope the selection panel is receptive to that rather than only wanting to be told what they want to hear.

Centre is a position where you can get involved in attack a fair bit but the degree of difficulty of the ball playing and decision making is much lower, it's more about how quickly and skillfully can you execute vs the more complex calls of which rein to pull. And the #1 desirable attribute for a centre is the ability to beat a man 1 on 1, which Sharpe is great at. I can see him going great there. A lot of the stuff he did well is also what Dane did so well when he came onto the scene.

Innovative coaches have often given their gun centres a bit of a roaming license and I wouldn't be opposed to that. I just do not think the dude is a half.
 
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HarVeeGee13 said:
I think he's a great footy player. I also think he's a terrible half on what we've seen so far. Not just "inexperienced" terrible, more like "I can't believe they thought this was a good idea" terrible. I've watched a fair few of our games back and I think having him there introduced a lot of issues with our set plays. I also think the way they tried to ease him in where he'd get into fullback like positions outside Kalyn also caused issues because I also think Kalyn really struggled with the finer points of playing in that first layer in shape work. And the dude is a theoretical general play kicker at best and I'm just not sure how that aspect is supposed to work, like is Ponga going to do almost all of it?

Please don't take this as me having a go at you because it's not, but I've seen lots of people suggest that Sharpe can transition not just to 6, but halfback, and I am honestly flabbergasted as to what anyone could have possibly seen to convince them. I know it was supposed to have looked good at training, but South Sydney were happy to let Adam Reynolds walk because Lachlan Ilias looks like a generational talent in training - real games are when things are stress tested.

It's not boredom, it's not excitement about the new shiny toy. It's actively not wanting Sharpe in the halves. If we didn't sign Sandon Smith I would be picking Gamble or even Cogger over Sharpe as Brown's halves partner. Yes, really. I think Kalyn plays his best footy with two genuine halves inside him and I don't foresee Sharpe developing into one any time soon.

I know I kind of got on your nerves a little bit when I read a bit much in to your comments about us developing a "Melbourne-style" attack, but I sincerely think, whatever our version of it looks like - I get that the idea isn't just to directly copy what they do - it won't work. I think there's a reason most clubs don't do that. And I think there will be coaches who tell them that, that their answer to getting the best out of Ponga/Brown/Sharpe is to play Sharpe elsewhere in the backline. I hope the selection panel is receptive to that rather than only wanting to be told what they want to hear.

Centre is a position where you can get involved in attack a fair bit but the degree of difficulty of the ball playing and decision making is much lower, it's more about how quickly and skillfully can you execute vs the more complex calls of which rein to pull. And the #1 desirable attribute for a centre is the ability to beat a man 1 on 1, which Sharpe is great at. I can see him going great there. A lot of the stuff he did well is also what Dane did so well when he came onto the scene.

Innovative coaches have often given their gun centres a bit of a roaming license and I wouldn't be opposed to that. I just do not think the dude is a half.
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I know dude, we have completely different views on Sharpe. But he's my guy.
 
Said all along I thought Peters had the best resume for the job but it doesn’t seem like he’s seriously in the frame. Other than him there’s no candidate that I feel strongly about one way or the other.

Not super confident in Holbrook or Green but I’d be fine with either and get on board. Morris or Young would be more underwhelming but I wouldn’t rip up my membership over it. If I’m rating my excitement out of 10 for each of those: Holbrook and Green are both about a 6, Morris maybe a 4 and Young a 3. Another season of AOB would’ve been less than a 3 so it’s all going to be an upgrade in my eyes to some extent, but not going to be too high or too low on any outcome.

With Holbrook & Morris - if they get the job it’ll be DESPITE their previous NRL head coaching stint and with the hope/belief that they’ll be much better this time around, which is why I don’t have any issue extending that same hope/belief to a coach without the prior experience if they do a better job at selling their vision. I don’t subscribe to the belief that you NEED to have head coach experience to possibly be a success.
 
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