Laurie Gant to replace McRae for me. With Gant at the helm we wouldn't need to worry about employing assistants.

You offering to exhume him YR ?

Being reported on the France federation site(ffr13) that Millward has been appointed as assistant coach.

His spirit would be enough JJ

Just to put the record straight Talau hasn't been appointed as an assistant coach. This has been misintepreted due to some lazy journalism that mentioned about Talau and Alker retiring and joining the coaching staff. It was just a badly written article that has caused a lot of confusion.

With regard to Hunte I wonder if he prefers the stability of doing what he may consider a long-term role with the club. If he was assistant and things went badly on the pitch or the head coach changed then he's more likely to lose his job. Maybe Alan has created a niche for himself within the club and wants to concentate soley on developing young players.

I do agree with you and the Saints fan about the meat to make a Pie comment! I don't think Mcrae could use the 'quality of players excuse' with the squad he's got for 2011, fail to make the top 8 next year and he will be gone! (And I wouldn't think he'd need telling)

Translation from the FFR13 Website: -

Former coach of St Helens, Leigh Centurions today, Australian Ian Millward has been recruited by Shaun McRae, the Salford coach, to become his deputy.

How true it is we'll have to wait and see...

Perhaps Alan gets a lot of job satisfaction out of his current role. However, you can't blame him for steering clear of the coaching setup at the moment. Simms, McRae, Millward and Alker. Something or someone is going down. Looks like a putsch to me. Remember Roy Evans? Next season could be messy.

At this rate we will have strength in depth both on and off the field!!

Maybe they are hoping having two negatives will turn it into a positive

FFS, shouldnt we judge them on next seasons results? Rather than laying into them both straight away

Can we have a McRae calling holiday until next season starts and see what happens now we have bought our meat at M & S and not Netto.

only a littlle light-hearted fun corvospace.

and as we all know fresh meat is better than frozen meat!!

I do hope if this is true that it isn't a case of too many cooks spoiling the Broth.

Though can only see this as a vehicle to get Millward settled in before SM calls it's quits at the end of his contract at the end of next season, can hardly see anyone new coming in with a fair sized back up team already in place and not being able to bring in his own people. Think Millward and Simms being very good friends will work to our advantage in the long run.

There is definitely no questioning what all three have achieved in the past, with Anderson being the pick of the bunch. McRae just isn't the same man anymore, and as much you blame it on the Salford fans attitude towards him, the fact still remains. Millward on the other hand is another question. He didn't exactly set the world alight at Wigan and hasn't held a top flight head coaches role since then. So was he just the right man, in the right place, with the right Saints team?

Millward loved his time at Saints and wanted to stay. He was fired for reasons no-one actually knows other than McManus fell out with him over something. Saints fans protested big time at the time because we all thought him fantastic. His heart was not in the job at Wigan. He has subsequently admitted that it was a mistake for him to go there. I think he has done very well with Leigh given where they were at the end of last season. It takes more than one season to rebuild a team and get them achieving to their potential. Look at Wigan itself. It took Nobby three years to get them to the point where they were competing in the playoffs and now the present coach has simply nudged them on further.

I wouldn't disagree with anthing you say. The Wigan job was/is a poisoned challice and any coach that doesn't make an instant impression is always going to lose out eventually. Unfortunately for Millward, so is the Salford job.

The fans expect, to be fair the fans have wrongly had their optimism built up over the years. The Gregory and Harrison years are prime examples. Harrison wasn't given a capable team until his last season, when it fell apart through injuries. It could be argued that the team merely over achieved the season before and allowed cracks to be papered over. Gregory, well, it's been documented what went wrong there.

McRae came with a big reputation, having had success with Saints and enjoying some success with Hull. After going back to Aus and struggling with a Rabbitoahs, he returns talking about having had a break and feeling refreshed. Quote, "Like someone had taken out the old battries and replaced them with new ones". Sounded like he was trying to convince himself more than us. Whenever he talks about Salford or whenever I've seen him on match day he doesn't seem particularly motivated.

On a tangent. Has anyone thought that with Alker needing surgery, he might not be physically capable of carrying out his job of assistant coach.

If Millward is the assistant to Mcrae Alker and Simms
who will be Millwards assistant.

Millward failed at wigan because of his St Helens roots and couldnt make the wigan team play his way like Brian Clough couldnt make Leeds United buy into his way of life in the 1970s

Leigh have little to no money and you cant polish a turd, saying that he took them from relegation candidates to playoff hopefuls so he must have been doing somthing right.

Have we got money then

I think Francis Cummins would be worth a punt for assistant. Although not sure he would want to go from Number 2 at Leeds to number 2 at Salford.

What about Daryl Powell at Featherstone, perhaps with a view to being considered for the Head Coaches job when McRae's contract expires? He does seem to have done a great job but I wonder how much of Fev's recent success could be down to the platform laid by lestyn Harris?

I was quite impressed with Talau last Sunday. It's a shame that he's going back down under, he actually has a lot knowledge that could be passed on and is very well respected. Before anyone says it was a misprint, I know.

I'd prefer someone else other than Millward! He's been found out this season at Leigh! He was even rubbish at Wigan! Need someone younger IMO, the likes of Cummins or John Sharp?

How was he "found out" at Leigh? He took a team that should have been relegated and got them to finish 3rd in the table, above the previous years champions. I think he did as well, if not better, than could have been expected.