The much maligned Wests Tigers management group made the best recruitment decision in the club’s short history when they handed the clipboard to Ivan Cleary.
Forget about Board Chairs and CEOs, the real figurehead in an NRL club is the head coach. Like any organisation leader they need to be skilled in communications, public relations and staff management along with having knowledge and a feel for the game.
Sports coaching experts will tell you that player relationships and getting the best out of individuals is probably 80 per cent of the job before technical knowledge and strategy come in to play.
When Jason Taylor was sacked after three games and Cleary was touted as a successor the talk was why would such a well-respected coach want to come to a ‘toxic’ organisation like the Tigers.
Cleary seems to relish a challenge and appears to be a builder rather than a maintainer. His responses to questions about why he would come to a ‘basket case’ of a club is he didn’t see it like that.
The thing about Ivan is people like and respect him. He has come from two clubs (Warriors and Panthers) where he has had to make some hard decisions on the futures of players and build the clubs back up and he is still referred to in a positive light.
Being a well-respected coach is not about being ‘soft’ or good mates with your team.
In less than a month he has put a line in the sand with contract negotiations, signed and re-signed key players, won some games and most importantly the hearts of players, fans and media.
He has even managed to make the right side edge defence look solid in a couple of games, something that supporters haven’t witnessed for a long while.
A couple of weeks ago the rugby league media were lining up to sink the boot into a club that was cowering defeated and rolling around on the ground.
Some of those commentators are now performing backflips as they gush about the future prospects of the Wests Tigers after having signed Ben Matulino, Josh Reynolds, Chris McQueen (previous to Cleary), Luke Brooks and David Nofoaluma.
There are good vibes for further signings of quality players to the club for the first time after a long recruitment drought.
Sure they will lose three very talented juniors and Tedesco in particular is irreplaceable, but it seems they had already made decisions to leave prior to Cleary being appointed.
The most noticeable turnaround has been with the fans. It seems everyone is on the bus with ‘Ivan the Great’ after three games at the helm.
It is a short time in the fickle world of rugby league fandom but it appears to be a time of hope and positivity at a club that has been divided since 2000.
The heritage club divide will always be there as long as there are supporters from the merged clubs drawing breath but in the last few seasons that divide has had more to do with the coach and player relationships.
Jason Taylor clearly has a good rugby league brain – he was touted as a very good assistant coach at the Roosters – but his history with player relationships is questionable.
Whether he was right or wrong in the Farah situation it was handled badly by both the club and the coach.
Communication and public relations were not a strong point with Taylor. To be honest he always looked like he was sucking on a lemon while facing the media firing squad. His responses to shellackings handed out to the team were along the lines of “yes we were soundly beaten but I saw good signs and we are not far off.”
Not what fans wanted to hear when they felt like their team was being humiliated.
In JT’s defence he was caught up in a salary cap mess not of his own doing that severely hampered his ability to purchase players.
Cleary has a clean slate to recruit and players appear to be lining up to be part of his team including from his previous clubs in Penrith and Auckland. Surely a sign of respect for Cleary as a coach and mentor.
One thing for certain is that Wests Tigers will have a vastly different squad in 2018. Whether it is successful is yet to be determined but I am confident that Ivan Cleary unlike most of predecessors will see out his contract term at the very least.
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