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Opinion

What makes a leader off the park?

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Roar Pro
7th July, 2021
20

The obvious issue from the Vaughan-gate drama is the underlying cultural issues that exist at the Dragons and the lack of leadership off the park from so-called ‘senior’ players.

Paul Vaughan is a senior player, on big money, a veteran of 181 first grade games plus both Origin and international rep honours.

In his last game against the Warriors, Vaughan ran for 262 metres, with an offload that lead to a crucial try.

So, how can a player contribute so well on the field but let themselves down so badly off the field? Leadership, or lack thereof, in this example.

The Dragons are certainly not alone in the NRL with off-field issues affecting on-field performances. A number of clubs immediately come to mind: the Bulldogs, Broncos and the Sharks, to name a few.

It’s hard to imagine this happening if Boyd Cordner or Cameron Smith were the Dragons club captain. The Dragons haven’t had a dominant club captain since Ben Hornby and it’s no coincidence that they won a comp under Ben’s leadership.

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In 2010, there was also a very good leadership group including Ben Creagh, Dean Young, Jason Nightingale, Matt Cooper etc. This mass player off-field protest wouldn’t have happened in during the glory days of 2009, 2010 or 2011.

And that’s what this was – a protest against the rules, saying ‘you can’t control what I do after hours!’.

Ben Hunt has done okay as captain but there’s obviously a lack of respect there because the COVID 13 thought they could get away with breaking the rules while Hunt was away for Origin.

So, what makes a great club captain?

He’s usually a one-club player who bleeds the club’s colours and sets the standard at training as well as on game day. He’s usually a rep player and often a captain at rep level.

He’s not afraid to call out poor behaviour and challenge his teammates to be better. He has a very strong relationship with the coach and works hand in glove to get the best out of the team.

The potential future Dragons club captain, Zac Lomax, has completely let himself down by attending the BBQ. Any credibility he had is now gone and that’s a huge loss for the club.

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The other issue is player recruitment – signing big money players with established behavioural problems never ends well. Matt Lodge, Corey Norman, Jack De Belin, Josh Dugan are all on big money but play on underperforming teams.

What happened here is a classic ‘while the cat’s away, the mice will play’ scenario.

Zac Lomax and others have shown themselves to be mice, not men.

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