Id be very suprised if Tony Smith broke his contract with KR. Hes never done so before.

He approached Leeds very late in the process before Agar was officially appointed, at that time Smith had a kind of temporary contract with KR to see them to the end of season as a caretaker. He was the only coach interviewed for the job but it was already Agar's job.

Yeah, i can see where you're coming from there. Interesting to see. I'd still have him back, but perhaps i'm being too nostalgic... i just want the good times to come back, it's been too long. The CC win was great but i think that was a red herring on where the club has been heading.

I would rather have a total stranger come in, look the place up and down and size it up and take the job on regardless of who's nose is put out of joint in a managerial sense than listen to another boring interview with the same boring platitudes and waffle. 5 years of transition and its always jam tomorrow.

We have to appoint people who have the hunger and drive to push us on, regardless of what colour shirt they may have worn in the past. Stop harping on about a "golden generation", Rhinos DNA and all the other trite soundbites and get on with the task of creating a new dynasty at Headingley.

Agree entirely. Someone to come in and remind everyone that the aim is to win trophies. Ideally entertaining as well, but do whatever it takes. It feels like the current setup is happy pottering around in an amateur kind of way hoping for the best but not being particularly upset if we lose. No passion, just a kind of slightly sad acceptance of garbage.

Indeed.

I agree and disagree with this. I think in life and sport, your greatest strength can also become your greatest weakness. The club seems incredibly loyal, at times to a fault. It's obvious that GH assured the golden generation that they would be offered a job following their playing careers if they stuck around. We've seen that now with JJB, Burrow, Sinfield, Peacock and I know Mags and Ablett were offered roles too. I don't think loyalty is a bad trait, and the club is not all about the first team.

At the same time, standards need to be met, and someone needs to drive them who is not afraid to upset a few people. It sounds like Furner got the wrong balance of doing this.

It also comes down to fans expectations. Under McDermott, we played a horrednous brand of rugby IMO, but managed to win loads of trophies. I'd rather we talk about Leeds DNA being a good style of play/open expansive rugby than going back to McDermott's way. Still, we have to win at the same time!

Don’t disagree but Dave Furner will tell you he tried that.

We are back to where we were prior to Gary first coming in (apart from the financials obviously). Ground up restart. Overhaul of coaching, playing staff and general set up with regards to recruitment and player development. If we have good youth teams the senior squad certainly hasn't benefited much recently. Leeds need to be producing international standard players as well as just decent club players with performance consistency issues.
I said this years ago that McDermott was not the man to manage a transition. He squeezed the best out of the squad he had but did nothing to secure the future or transition the playing squad. He wasn't helped much by the people (person) above him either. We are now reaping the grim rewards of that period.

All good fun.

He did, and it was the fallout with JJB and then Kev that did for him. His coaching wasn’t brilliant either.

Successful sports teams often have this problem when coming to the end of a dynasty and it can take years to become successful again see Liverpool FC after Dalglish left, Man Utd after Ferguson and Yorkshire County Cricket after the 1960s.

In RL look at Hull FC after 1985, Wigan after 1995 or the Bulls after 2005.

Success tends to be cyclical but I think those that cling onto the old memories with jobs for the boys seem to do less well.

Precisely ^^^^^^^

Furner soon realised he had so much dross in the squad and wanted and told Sir Kev he needed a clear out……and let’s face it..he was right…..his problem was that he told the players that and without exactly naming names, he told the press as well and in those moments he completely lost the dressing room and player power got rid of him.

Furner was straight talking and told them how it was but upset too many people in the process who were happy meandering along

Furner by all accounts was not a good man manager - id argue he wasn’t a good coach either, we were utterly terrible under him

As opposed to Agar who has done little but had plenty of excuses to fall back on.

Agar took us from being knocked out by a championship side to winning the Challenge Cup and from relegation battle to the semis last year.

I don’t think he should be our coach going forward but there’s no need for the revisionism, especially with regards to Furner, who was terrible.

Furner seemingly tried to do the right thing but did a terrible job of it. He clearly lost the squad very quickly and some of his signings (notably Tui) were terrible. His record at Canberra was bad and he hadn't been looked at as head coach since in the NRL.

That doesn't mean it can't work or the need for radical change is wrong. It just needs someone capable of doing it properly. Which is why you actually look systematically, and not just call the next ex-player looking for a job.

Yep, id have no issues with someone coming in and shaking things up, they do however have to be the right person to do it, Furner clearly wasn’t.

I think Sinfield did a lot if good things when he came back, hiring furner however was his worst call!

I take your point but I would say that the RL teams you mention all suffered from one issue, they ran out of money. Hull on the "awesome foursome" - leading to the sale of Schoey and Crooks to us, Wigan had to sell their ground, and Bradford, well we know what happened to Bradford. Leeds (as far as we know) have not the same drastic money issues. Or maybe we have run out? Ground redevelopment before playing staff?

I don’t think we’ve run out of money but it might not be a coincidence that the stadium redevelopment has coincided with the playing squad/coaching staff not being up to scratch. The stadium needed doing and they have done a fabulous job on it.

Our strength was also our weakness when it came to the pandemic with regards to the stadium complex.

We will get back up there but it seems its going to take a bit longer than all of us wanted, the next coaching appointment is critical and that’s why im happy for the club to wait to get it right.

I also don’t think the season is written off just yet, a lot can happen in a season.

Definitely had a massive cash flow issue re lack of ability to pay back ground developments because of revenue lost because of Covid. It's had a clear impact on some our retention and recruitment too. Pre pandemic Myler was heading to Toronto and Jai Field was the likely replacement. Sutcliffe was on the market and likely to go. Covid made players and clubs take a much more risk averse outlook. This at a time when we really needed some quality. Don't think the much loved Bodene would have ended up at the club had cash not been so tight.

Agree. There's most definitely a correlation between Covid, the new stadium and the playing squad not being up to scratch. We don't have the money to spend that we used to have but it will come again in time. We must show signs of progression though for that to happen and we're going nowhere fast under Agar. I'm already feeling very flat about this season and I'm not alone. Shudder to think of the score at home to Saints if we don't buck our ideas up.

If I was GH I'd be looking to recruit someone from one of the leading NRL sides. Obviously you won't get a head coach but you may get an assistant who could use a SL job as a stepping stone. Like a future Trent Robinson for instance.

I'd be seeing which assistants at clubs like Melbourne Storm and Sydney Roosters might be interested. Time to be a bit proactive and go and get someone. Someone from a proven setup is what you want - the Storm in particular would be a setup I'd want to try and follow.

The good news for British clubs is that SL will be seen by some ambitious coaches as a stepping stone to an NRL gig. There's luck involved with getting the right person as well, but the pool in Australia is really big.

The downside is that you may only get to keep said coach for 2-3 years until they're headhunted for an NRL headcoach role. But od take anything now.

Got to got to go.

Does Ryan Sheridan finally fancy a head coach role? Richard Marshall. Does Ellery fancy it.