The Tigers and Dragons need to stop treating their fans like fools
Is there a greater cop-out in rugby league than a club announcing it will launch an “exhausting review� It’s the fluffy, corporate gibber-jabber management spits out when it’s run out of answers.
The Wests Tigers are about to conduct a review that will arrive at a result we already know: Michael Maguire ushered out the door and another poor soul given the NRL’s toughest job before he, too, is inevitably thrown on the scrapheap. Next!
The Dragons asked Phil Gould to conduct a review at the end of a miserable 2019, told him coach Paul McGregor couldn’t be sacked, then sacked McGregor after a miserable 2020, then brought in Anthony Griffin, who has presided over a miserable 2021.
It hasn’t just been a special year for the NRL’s joint ventures â€" it’s been a special decade: the Tigers haven’t played finals football since 2011, the Dragons have reached the playoffs twice.
The comparisons are compelling: two clubs featuring one partner that holds all the money (WIN Corp in the case of the Dragons, Wests Ashfield in the case of the Tigers); two dysfunctional boards with deep distrust between factions that don’t see themselves as a united entity; two rosters loaded with players whose hands should be shaking when collecting their pay packets; two football departments incapable of finding a solution, digging a deeper hole with every move they make.
Let’s start with the Dragons. Nudging back-rower Tariq Sims out the door is yet another baffling decision from a club making it up as it goes.
Wests Tigers chief executive Justin Pascoe is leading a review into coach Michael Maguire.Credit:Fairfax
Sims has been told he can talk to other clubs. The messaging has been murky: is it because of salary cap problems or because, at 31, he’s too old? He’s been told both.
Griffin played down the significance of the move after the loss to Souths on Saturday night, claiming there had been nothing more than a “conversationâ€.
The reality is he’s been told he’s not wanted; another local junior treated like garbage by the club where he wants to retire. Sends a great message to the young stars coming through.
The bottom line is Sims wanted two more years on his deal, which expires at the end of next year, for less money than he’s on now.
Sure, he’s been inconsistent at times but name a player in that Dragons’ team who hasn’t. He played the house down for Brad Fittler’s NSW side in this year’s Origin series victory.
He also brings something you won’t find on the stats sheet. Like Sharks-bound former captain Cameron McInnes, Sims is a good player but a better club man. Now he’s been moved along to make room for … whom?
The Roosters are already eyeing him off as a great buy for the remainder of his career. Shouldn’t he be a great buy for the remainder of his career at the Dragons?
The developing Sims situation is another example of a club unsure of what it wants to be and the people it wants playing for them.
From the decision to move on McInnes, to entertaining the signing of Israel Folau, to the shabby treatment of Matt Dufty, to considering Jack de Belin as captain recently ahead of Sims, to carrying perennially suspended players like Josh McGuire on their books, to signing broken down players like George Burgess, to the coach wanting to re-sign Corey Norman before being overruled then belligerently sticking with him until the very last minute of his final match when he dropped the ball, it’s fair to say the Dragons haven’t really kicked on since sacking McGregor.
Tariq Sims was a State of Origin standout and is a great club man - yet the Dragons have pushed him out the door.Credit:Getty
Doubtless, the Paul Vaughan barbecue will be used as an excuse for a season gone wrong, just as the de Belin situation was for the past three years. Another cop-out.
It’s says something about the strength of the club when 13 players ignored the instructions of the coach and head of football and did it anyway, breaching the law and the NRL’s biosecurity rules.
It says something about the strength of the club that captain Ben Hunt knew about it and said nothing. The argument is he shouldn’t be a snitch. The last time I looked this was a professional football team, not Year 7.
The blame, though, isn’t with Griffin. It’s the people who appointed him: a board divided by the blazer wearers from the St George side of the merger and the miserly appointees from WIN, who have allowed mediocrity to become the standard at a once-proud club.
Meanwhile, over at the Tigers, a searching week-long review is already underway. What will it uncover?! What a pity the Fox Sports cameras can’t be in the rooms for this juicy sequel to Tales From Tiger Town.
The review is being conducted by head of football Adam Hartigan and chief executive Justin Pascoe.
Hartigan came to the Tigers from the Roosters. He’s hardly set the world afire. Maguire has been blamed for the club’s inability to sign big-name players. Any players for that matter.
At what point does Hartigan wear some blame? Maybe it will come up in the review â€" that he’s running.
Pascoe has been dodging the blame for the Tigers’ on-field performance for months, which is interesting when he’s been chief executive for six years and was front and centre on game-day in the Fox Sports docu-series.
Maguire barely came out of the doco with his coaching reputation intact. He’s a coach who cares, but how many of them don’t? It was a worrying sign in the first episode when he became emotional in front of his group after a loss … in the second match of the season.
But the coach can’t wear the blame forever at the Tigers.
The line from both the board and management was consistent as the season went down the toilet: we’ve given the football department everything they need, they still haven’t performed, it’s on them, it’s not us, we’re the front office etc.
Now that’s a cop-out because, the last time anyone looked, the buck stops with the person at the top in any organisation.
Perhaps it’s time for the people who run the Tigers and Dragons to review themselves.
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