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In the NRL there just always has to be a scandal or at least a really saucy rumour. If something suss is not going on, well… let’s just make something up.
South Sydney are facing that type of rumour and innuendo right now: “Have you heard what’s going on at Souths?”
To read more Brian Smith, outside The Roar, check out his website SmithySpeaks.
A 1 and 3 start was not on the agenda, especially after that memorable victory over the Roosters in Round 1, and now Michael Maguire is facing a crisis of sorts for the first time since he began his stellar time with the mighty red and greens.
From my perspective, having worn this agenda-driven stuff too often, I see some worrying signs in their club at present but nothing that can’t be fixed and fixed quickly.
From the inside it may be different. Only those there will know what’s really happening, so when someone wants to tell you they “know what’s going on”, I suggest you treat it very carefully, lest you become one of those who spread rumours.
More likely and far more interesting are the footy problems they face.
After a couple of seasons of growth and winning respect across the whole club, season three of Maguire’s era is an obvious crossroad. I faced this at St George in the early 90s and Parramatta in my 10 seasons there.
Taking a previously under-performing club then enjoying its growth is a wonderful feeling, and the mighty Rabbits have done that during Maguire’s tenure. But it leaves a hole.
Professional clubs know that winning a premiership is the ultimate goal. Until this goal is achieved, there is more to be done. But where does more come from?
Do we need to make personnel changes, or strategic changes to preparation in preseason? Is it me that needs a makeover, to reinvent some parts of my role in the organisation? Or can we get some real improvement in the team from maintaining the status quo, by repeating what we all know?
I don’t know Michael Maguire well enough to know exactly what is going through his head right now, but it appears to be this.
A pretty big decision was made to move captain John Sutton to lock this season. The team will have trained that way and built all the add-ons that come from Luke Keary becoming the new five-eighth. This change had me very excited about what could happen to the team’s attack, with a worry or two about the defence.
Keary’s lengthy layoff with a pectoral injury, Sutton’s return to #6, then the serious injury to dummy-half Isaac Luke and concussion mid-game to Greg Inglis has thrown those plans out the window. That will be disappointing and disruptive. For a team like Souths, built on discipline and repetition, this is more disruptive than usual.
My other concern – it’s another I have faced, as has almost every coach and club in this modern era – is the knowledge that an admired and loved player, a key figure in the team, no longer feels the same way the rest of us do about the team and each other. He wants something else – money, prestige, opportunity, something new, all of the above?
It’s difficult to read and handle, especially when those on-field disruptions Souths are facing right now cut in.
There are two quotes that come to mind that I could pass on to Coach Maguire:
“This is why you are on the big bucks.”
“If the job was easy, everyone could do it.”
But my personal preference is from US General Schwarzkopf – “Do what’s right!”
He was suggesting that we should forget the crap, what others with vested interests will toss up, what might meet with more favourable comment from the influential and do what’s right.
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