Well, it seems to be just me now. The received wisdom is that SM must go, for whoever takes his place can’t possibly do worse, and acceptance of this seems almost universal.

I find this unsurprising. Anyone who indulges in a bit of schadenfreude by sneaking a look on the boards of whichever side is in a rut will see nothing on RAB that they haven’t seen a hundred, a thousand times before – the coach is clueless, the recruitment is awful, the players don’t care and don’t seem to have a gameplan.

I suspect it stems from the nature of being a fan. We watch the side, desperately wanting it to do well but unavailable to influence outcomes or even to know for sure why they occur. We rhubarb on here and on the terraces, but who would be confident they really understand what is afoot?

No one likes impotence. No one likes being out of control. So the wishful thinking sets in. If only we took action X, an action so simple it can be performed in a single day, an hour, a minute. Then things would be better.

Well, wise up. There is no magic bullet here. The things that made Bradford an exceptional club in the first decade of Super League are gone, long gone. That is partly down to others getting up to speed, and it is partly down to the mismanagement of the club that saw success in the here and now prioritised over sustainability.

Now we have management of the club that is focused on securing Bradford’s Super League status in the long term. And they’re clearly aware that while our contribution to the competition goes without saying, other areas must come up to speed and fast, chiefly youth development and the state of the stadium. Get these right and the club will be stronger on paper and in practice.

Unfortunately, while that is going on, there are still first team fixtures to be fulfilled. People on here seem to think it is still 1999 and the rest of the league are an amateurish set of mugs to be dispatched with ease. They are not and we should be glad they are not. But despite a record that compares favourably with every club in the league with exception of two (the two that sorted their youth system years ago), the myth has arisen that we are exceptionally poor, and that this is proof that McNamara is not and never will be a competent Super League coach.

A look at the league tables during his time should be enough to dispel this. 2006 – better than all but three. 2007 – better than all but two. 2008 – better than all but four. And a dispassionate look at the names suggested as his replacement turns up some startling results. Justin Morgan, a coach widely praised and suggested as a possible replacement for SM by Eddie has these stinkers on his cv from just last year, scorelines that would be deemed intolerable were they replicated by a McNamara Bulls side.



What happened here? What is the explanation? Did Morgan forget how to coach his side for these fixtures, which make up a full third of his season? Or is that any side of limited resources will be prone to such performances where fans come away feeling perhaps justifiably that their time and admission money would have been better spent elsewhere.

Rovers’ fans limited expectations have bought Morgan time, though not so much that there hasn’t been similar ‘Have we got the right man for the job?’ hand-wringing on their board from time to time. But among Bradford fans it is a different story. We are the side to have won silverware more recently than any other than the you-know-two. Yet this seems to make us less patient rather than more.

We could have a new coach come in (though what we would pay him with has yet to be explained). He could even turn us round in the short term, though I would be surprised. The club has been on the slide in playing terms since 2003. We had enough remnants of the last great side we had to make it to the Grand Final in 2004 and 2005 but anyone that was on this board back then during the regular season will remember the same miserablism that abounds today was very much prevalent then too. Since then we have had a brief rally in 2007, followed by relapse last year and perhaps this too. The momentum is in reverse and it will take something seismic to have it heading northward again.

We have something seismic. We have two things. OSV and the reform of the youth development system. Neither will impact on first team results any time soon. But Hood and McNamara are working like Trojans to effect those changes. That’s not enough for some. Laughably they urge McNamara and Hood to walk away, unaware that had the pair done just that in 2006 then we would have all got to see what a failing, falling club really looks like. Our pals from the other side of Shelf give you some idea. If we are to avoid their fate then we can’t let fears over what happens next week override our plans for what is to take place over the next decade. Get behind the club and its management during these lean times. I don’t want to be the only one saying ‘I told you so’ a few years down the line.

The only way a coach can hope or expect to keep his job in a crisis is when there are signs of better things to come. That performance against Wigan was so devoid of positives, so entirely lacking in reasons for a shred of optimism, that I simply cannot imagine how Steves position is tenable.

Loyalty is vital in a well run club. Loyalty stopped a hasty decision to get rid of Noble in the season where a grim start gave way to a championship winning run. But misplaced loyalty is the most dangerous thing of all and I worry that Cullen's frankly absurd tenure at Warrington may be the benchmark at work here.

You may have gathered that the Wigan game knocked me a long way off the fence.

Lots of good, logical and factual stuff in there AF.

I particularly like the thought of several regular (can regular also cover copious?) posters nearly choking on the bile they're having to hold back as they read it



As a Northern/Bulls fan I hope you're right. I'd certainly like to believe all of that. . . . I just don't think we'll get to see some of those people in the longterm future of the club.

I think that the Wigan loss was a watershed match. I'd like to think that it was so in terms of commitment, skill, drive, determination, team spirit for the rest of the season . . . . . time will tell.

That is an excellent post af and I wish I could say that your analysis was wrong.

The problem that I have, is that whilst development off the pitch is vital, it isn't mutually exclusive to having a decent team.

I don't want to sound like Paul Cullen here, but most of the points scored by Wigan were down to mistakes - something that a coach can't legislate for unless you talk about recruitment and this is an area where I feel McNamara has performed OK (relative to what has been available).

My issue is with the attack - there are still too many flat passes, there is no speed (of thought or foot), precious few dummy runners, little effective offloading and so on. These are things that the current players are capable of (to a degree) and the coach should be rectifying the situation and SM is failing to that.

It is one thing to lose a game through mistakes, but another entirely to not even compete and I don't see how the OSV or Noble's ignorance of the youth system can act as excuses for the lack of improvement.

Cullen was derided for failure to take advantage of his felicitous circumstaces, namely a wealthy backer, a new ground and a swelled support. None of these trouble SM sadly. Also, Wire appear to have the wherewithal to stand the salary of a second head coach. I don't see anyone with the answers at how we pay of SM and his backroom staff while making an attractive offer to AN Other and whoever he wants to bring with him.


I just don't undertsand how the Wigan game, bad as it was, extinguishes hope. Wigan themselves were markedly worse at the MM last year, and I suspect in their home pummeling by Huddersfield, but it didn't stop them being the side that offered the most resistance to Leeds and Saints.

I'll give you a game to extinguish hope - losing to an 11 man Saints at Odsal in 1995. Nothing is more woeful than seeing a two man advantage going to waste over the course of an excruciating half hour. I have a feeling Saints even extended their lead! Now we all know that Brian Smith side came good within the course of the next twelve months. Brian McDermott himself, dontcha know, told me that given the state of Super League at the time, the improvment they made didn't have to be so great in order to see a big shift. Now the whipping boys are ready to do some whipping of their own if you're not on your game so it's going to be harder than it was back then, and we're unlkely to see such a quantum leap.

I find it frustrating that while fans on here and other boards constantly decry short-termism in RL's management, then scurry back to the quick-fix position when things get tough. No one on here has established that McNamara is 'crap' and no one has any serious ideas for an alternative. Yet still the clamour is to dive off the cliff, dash ourselves on the rocks and be done with it. Let's get a grip.

While depressed about performances and unable to see where our first win will come from I fail to see what benefit there will be in sacking our coach now.
His contract is up at the end of the season and if he needs to go he should go then.
For me macs biggest failing is that he lacks any sort of good luck. Many on here say he is full of excuses but he has been genuinely unlucky. If his luck does not improve then we need a planned replacement at end of season

Four very well reasoned posts so far (may be more by the time I finish this). Brilliant to see considered reason is starting to displace the understandable initial knee-jerk reactions. I'm just going to pour out some quick - probably too quick - thoughts; time is short so bear with me.

Firstly though Andrew, more fool you cos you know what happens to folk who put their head up above the parapet though...









As it happens, I agree with most of what you said (no big surprises there). But I also find it hard not to have considerable sympathy with Shaggoth's and Stul's concerns. I fear they are expressing the feeling now of a majority of the fans.

I think Bullpower has it right in that the Wigan debacle (I don't want to credit it with calling it a match) will prove a watershed. We simply cannot afford to see a repeat of that - the club more than everyone. That game made us the pitiable laughing stock of the game, and much more of that and you can forget all the future positives - we'll not get there as a club if the support and prospective recruits and prospective sponsors lose hope!

But a similar issue has been dominant on the Pieboard and the Wireboard of late, and so its not just us. And, as with them, its surely just as fixable, so I'm not sure we need to all go looking for that rope and a low beam - or a scaffold - just this minute. (Even if knowing where to find them if needed might be prudent...

)

There are clearly severe constraints behind the scenes at the moment. Back to that in a min. What matters most immediately though surely is to make sure Saturday is seen to be the nadir, and to see serious improvement - and quickly? Steve seemed to be at a loss to understand or explain the debacle - injuries and illness notwithstanding - and unfortunately for him it is HE who is charged with getting to grips with it and fixing it. Sacking him before he has had the opportunity to do so would be counterproductive madness IMO, unless there are compelling and urgent reasons which make that essential. Completely losing the dressing room is the only such reason I can think of - surely that has not happened??

Wakefield have shown us that you don't need a team of superstars, or even anything like a full uninjured first team, to perform well and above expectations. Seems we need to learn something from their achievement and pretty quickly? The difference APPEARS to be that they were playing as a team and were working their gonads off for each other. I suggest that's what Bulls fans want to see from our lads, cos its not looked that way? That's got to be the challenge for Steve and the senior players this week - and the injury crisis is not doing them any favours. Thats my tuppenceworth, anyway.

Whatever else needs addressing, giving the fans hope that Steve is right and we WILL see a big improvement has to be the priority now. Shaggoth hit it spot on there IMO.

But, as I have alluded to elsewhere, I think we also need the club to level with us a bit more and tell it how it really is. And if that means being brutally honest about the financial implications of disappointing attendances, about the financial implications of having no wealthy backer in a city which is going to hell in a handcart right now, about the morale and motivation implications of fans being on certain players' backs all the time (especially Platt who some campaigns are making a scapegoat) and about the reasons behind some of the recruitment and off-field decisions that have been taken, well so be it.

Until some of the facts of life are a bit more clear - and that especially includes the future opportunities being pursued and not just the current challenges and constraints - too many folk are going to continue to think we are indeed still in 1999. I think the club needs to consider whether the need to maintain a very upbeat public position and confidentiality regarding the business generally is proving counterproductive?

And if, having heard the facts of life some "fans" choose to walk, well that was going to happen sooner or later anyway, I suggest? But hopefully the rest of the fans - and a whole load of waverers and maybe fans - might then have better understanding of the causes of where we are now and not just the symptoms? And see the club as again something worth sticking with and backing, and supporting, through the difficult times until things DO improve?

So I suggest the coach, the team AND the board need to each play their part to get the fans back onside. And soon. Cos we all know what happens to a house divided; and we've seen in the past what can be achieved when club, team and fans are relatively united in what we are seeking to achieve and how we get there.

We all need to find the way to become united again in hope and confidence in the future.

BTW, have a look at Salford. They sacked their coach, a former Bradford assistant under Noble who had a strong first full season with the club before a disappointing play-off exit and subsequent tailing away the next season. They replaced him with an experienced trophy-winning coach, as good as any they could hope to attract. How's that working out for them? Doesn't appear to have been a miracle cure, does it?

Exactly.

And they had a Wilkinson to pay for it.

Too bloody right my friend.

And not just him, but the club as a whole. And, as we saw tonight, so it goes on.

But you'll get no sympathy for that view from other teams' supporters - we are just whingers blaming the Clown, Hetherington, Ganson, the RFL, the Council, the Foreign Office, Uncle Tom Cobleigh... (even though it IS all their fault, especially old Tom...

)

And not that much from most of ours either.

And in fairness, regardless of whose fault it is we have to play the hands we are dealt. As does every other club. Life was never fair; we just have to live with it. I'm sure Steve is as alive to that as anyone.

The things is Adey, when Wakey are going well they are held up as a benchmark. When they are losing nine of their last ten games of the season, with sixty put on them on Wire and a kick short of fifty at home to Cas they're forgotten about and another, more in-form side is used as the stick to beat McNamara with.

I sympathise a lot with your calls for tranparency, but the club have gone a long way to make it clear what's going on. Many just don't want to know, writing it off as 'excuses'.

As for effort being all the fans want to see... I don't think that's the case either, going by the first two games of the year where effort was generally agreed not to be lacking. Some still accused the players of not trying, while other conceded that they had but made it clear that still wasn't good enough.

This place is a bit of an echo chamber and not half as important as we'd like to think it is. I still think it takes big stuff to shift wider perceptions - summer rugby, getting to Wembley and winning trophies for the first time in yonks were it in 1996. Now don't think even winning trophies wll really cut it. There was little bump from either of our 2003 or 2005 wins.

The good news is we do have big stuff that looks achievable - a pack full of Burgesses would help put the club back on the national map; a team full of young British lads would be something the whole game would have to applaud; the OSV would be such a shock to every Bradfordian, most of whom seem unaware that this scheme actually looks like it has a chance, that they might even crack a smile. Might. Just maybe.

Andrew, for the avoidance of doubt - I am going on about perceptions more than realities.

Like as you rightly point out re Wakefield - John Kear has a track record of getting teams to overperform short-term, but long-term his record is far more suspect. Maybe I was naive in using them to demonstrate a point, but I deliberately emphasised "APPEARS" to try and get across that its perceptions that are pretty crucial right now.

The big problem now is that - for valid reasons or otherwise is not the real issue - we have a support base which appears in general to be pretty negative and demoralised. You well know a lot of that negativity is doing my head in (and ME can probably attest to that a wee bit too...

) but we have to recognise that its there and will continue to be there until something happens to break the cycle of negativity.

As you point out, the received wisdom of how to do that is to sack the coach. Then it will all be alright again.

You and I and some others believe that would be madness in the extreme right now - and I'm sure we don't believe for one minute the club are contemplating that whatever clamour there is from the "fans".

What I was doing was trying to suggest more appropriate means of breaking the cycle - by which we really mean changing the fans' perceptions. At the moment its like a mass meeting of the 1970s - hands of the vocal and active members go up at the front, and the masses behind follow. If more of those vocal and active members at the front have their perceptions changed, it will have a huge leverage effect IMO - NOT (just) on here, but at the ground and in the pubs and in the workplace and everywhere else where it really matters.

Rightly or wrongly, the only people who can shift the current perceptions are up at Odsal.

There is no reasonto sack the coach.

We can't afford to sack the coach.

We don't need to sack the coach. We have a rare thing, as a result of the franchise process: we may have struck lucky in this respect. As it happens, the current early phase of our re-building co-incides with no relegation till 2012. Happy days, because it doesn't matter, even if we finished rock bottom, we would not go down. So unless Hood & Co become convinced they have the wrong man, the calls for Mac's head are never going to be answered. Why? Well, the hotheads just need to realise that a club is only going to sack the coach for no reason other than a change of scenery if it is in danger of serious consequences such as relegation. If that doesn't apply then why would they waste all that money?

There is no better coach available and affordable anyway.

Don't get me wrong - we can't afford performances like Wigan. It is stating the obvious that if that effort suddenly became the norm, then indeed the coach [iwould[/i go in short order. But thankfully we extremely rarely get such poor efforts. A handsome win soon would be sweet, but it wouldn't make us the champions, any more than that freak horror show makes us the dunces. The rality is we are and will by the end of the year still be in an early re-building phase, and we just have to get used to the idea.

All of which is fair enough and very well meaning. But the underlying assumption is that those in charge believe that McNamara is the best long term option and also that they are right

Where though is the line beyond which McNamara is no longer good enough? In the argument on this thread what would need to happen for there to be a regime change? What criteria for success as coach of Bradford Bulls should we be applying in the short, medium and long term?

There is a very good point made on a thread elsewhere about the Bradford legacy and coaches throughout SL brought up in the Bradford team of 10 years ago, that by implication they have not had the learning to succeed in the more modern game, that Steve McNamara (and others) are not good enough. And it is that that is my primary concern. I don't think that McNamara is the right man for the medium or long term. Simple. Short term is a point for discussion I suppose.

Apologies that this is a pretty prosaic post in the context of this thread and also that it doesn't offer a solution, but I do think that it is at the heart of the issue.

Had we won our first two games (which could quite easily of happened) would it still be this bad?

Yes, the Wigan game was a disaster, but it wasn't the first big defeat and it won't be the last we'll ever see.

Is Macca the right man - probably not, but as other posters have put, who else is there? The franchise system allows us to try and build a team - granted Macca doesn't seem to be doing a great job at the minute and has had a couple of seasons to do this.

But,

We have to admit that our time as challengers for trophies has gone, we're on the downer from the most successful period in the clubs history.

The sooner most fans realise that the salary cap is starting to work and that our club is not the standard bearer for the league the better.

We need the OSV to come off for investment in the club (and city) and a few more years for the kids to come through and be established in the first team. We all know this is an area the club has focused on but won't bear fruit immediately.

I'm afraid it's gong to be a long haul - the quicker you accept it - the better.

So the underlying thoughts in this thread are that:
1) accept that we are rebuilding.

Questions - Are we? What evidence is there for that? What have the club said? Are we blooding new youngsters this season then? Were we not rebuilding last season?

2) accept that we have no divine right to win every game.

I accept that. But we should still be competing in every game shouldn't we?

3) we might finish bottom, but that's ok this season as there is no relegation.

Is it really ok? We, as fans, would be happy with that would we? I'm not sure I would. Is that really all we can aim for this year?

4) accept that Macnamara has a master plan to get us through this and knows where we are going

Ok, it would be nice to know what it was though, and where we are going and when we are likely to get there.

5) accept there is noone else available as coach and no more players coming in.

No, sorry I don't accept that. We have not spent up to the salary cap, that has been widely mentioned, we missed out on Bird, so we have money. What are we going to do with it? Who are we signing?

I think the club should perhaps speak out a bit and let the fans know whats going on.

I understand the frustrations of many on here, but it is still too early to be thinking about sacking the coach.

It will be critical how the team responds in the next few games. Anymore like the Wigan game and I think McNamara could be out, but if the team can show marked improvement or even get into winning ways then he should be OK.

As I've said before, it is silly to sack coaches during the season unless things have hit rock bottom and show no sign of getting better. If McNamara was going to go he should have been sacked at the end of last season; as he wasn't he should see out his contract until the end of this season unless the Wigan result wasn't just a flash in the pan.

Its come to something when it takes a Leeds fan to talk utter and complete sense on this forum!

Regarding a god time to sack a coach:

The coach needs to go before any decisions are made regarding the following season. If they are thinking of letting him go, he should not be involved in any potential contract negotiations for playing or coaching staff.
This gives the incoming person a much freer hand in assembling his own side.

In my opinion, we should use the money we were going to spend on Bird to pay off McNamara, St Hillaire, Richards, and Clawson. If we need to pay them off that is!

Keep Medley in a caretaker/transition role, and let Morrison and Menzies do some coaching in the very short term.

We should do nothing until we have a signed contract with the next coach, as the whole coaching team, not just Mcnamara needs changing.

As I've said on a few other threads it's no good firing the coach unless the alternative is a proven candidate who could do better. As I see it there aren't too many of those around, if any.

As many have said on this thread the only way the club's hand could be forced on this is if the shocking performance at Wigan became the norm. If that happened there's no option but to sack McNamara as performances like that jeopardise the whole future of the club.

It'd be a gamble to get rid but if crowds start plummeting to 7 or 8k due to poor performances they have no option but to take the gamble.

It does say something about our decline that we are now using Hull KR and Wakefield as our benchmarks rather than Leeds and St Helens.

Clearly it is too early in the season to fire the coach, although repeats of the lack of intensity shown in the Wigan performance would be a major concern. Performances in the next few matches do need to demonstrate that the coach has the support of the players.

IF there is to be a change of coach, leaving the decision until the end of the season would be a mistake. Players contracts for next year would largely be sorted by then, leaving a new coach dependent on the current coach's signings (an area in which he hasnt excelled). Recruitment would also be difficult if prospective players players were unsure who would be in charge next year. A decision would really have to be taken by mid summer.

At the start of the season most Bulls fans that I know had limited their expectations for this season to clear evidence of progress (something which does seem apparent at Hull KR despite the variability of their performances). We should know by July whether we are progressing or going backwards.

Given that I neither started, nor contributed to a recent thread on this matter, this is a pretty unfair comment.

I accept that he is a name that could be in the frame but attributing me with this is not exactly correct.

On Justin Morgan, the difference there is that he has brought a club up from a lower division, made some quality signings that Bradford should have been in the running for (e.g. Webster, Fox, possibly even Walker, Vella, Newton etc), and also managed to perform occasionally against the bigger clubs, which Bradford seem incapable of doing since 2007. Against this backdrop the occasional big losses can often be overlooked by the fans - again their expectations weren't high in the past but that won't be the case for ever.

The problem with McNamara is that things seem to be getting gradually worse every year, despite his efforts to reverse things; other coaches at 'lesser' clubs (Morgan, Matterson, Kear etc) at least give the impression that improvements are being made from previous seasons. If this downward spiral continues the club have to ask if McNamara is the right person given the resources avaiulable to take Bradford forward - but he at least needs time to show that his 2009 team can deliver. Look at Huddersfield in 2007 - started with many consecutive wins and then went on to make the play-offs.

As I've said on another thread there is a lot of talk about the re-building process but as far as the 1st team is concerned it is still in decline when ones plots results and performances since 2005. Fans won't wear the "re-building" line forever if the first team continues to decline and at some stage will need to see evidence of it bearing fruit.

Most of us aren't asking for the earth. We just want to see positive progress and signs of recovery in the next few years.

Yes we do. Stock should be taken at the end of this season, and see whether and how far we have progressed, and what we have coming through. With the obvious caveat that performances like vs. Wigan are simply unacceptable, by any team at any time, and cannot be repeated.

But some fans [iare[/i asking the earth. They want us to be either winning everything, or at least strongly challenging to win everything now, and all the time, permanently, "because we should be beating teams like these".