Eels Blogs

As our season unofficially closed this weekend and attentions get turned to next season, I was struck by the coaching maturity of Jason Ryles.

Here is a man, a rookie coach, completely reinventing our Eels.

Not just changing a couple of players here and there, but single handedly undertaking a complete overhaul of the fundamentals to a successful NRL club. Jason Ryles is now the public face of our club, front and centre week in week out, ready to shoulder the burden of news hungry reporters throughout the NRL world. 

Some feel he has lost the plot, and that the cracks are begining to show and the criticism is loud. He is under fire, his bizzare decisions, giving up on this year, snapping in pressersm

However, I see something else. I'm seeing a man with a vision and a plan to turn our club into a powerhouse, i'm seeing grit, true grit im seeing bravery and im seeing it in bucketloads. From the start Ryles began with the bloated overpaid salaries earnt by some players. These salaries were skewering our salary cap and were not proportional to regular deeds on the field. Reputations were considered secondary to ensuring our cap was brought back under control. The power that was once with the Eels playing roster was removed, brick by brick, player by player. It was no secret that the Eels club were soft on the players, the players were getting away with way too much, they were dictating player options in contracts, they were dictating and ransoming their $$ figures at renegotiation times, loyalty was non existant, the order of the day was to screw the club, they would always fold and the player would get more $$, more options, or more contract years then they would get anywhere else. Ryles immediatley put a stop to it. 

This one act of taking back the power in favour of the club has led to so many improvements. The turning over of players and those that have been tapped on the shoulder this year is showing the new Eels mantra. Club first mentality. Jason Ryles is embracing and demanding a new culture, a culture where the club, the team come first, a culture of we want players that want to be here. Its refreshing, it's exciting and it's for the betterment of our club.

This week Jason Ryles has displayed maturity worthy of a seasoned Craig Bellamy or a Wayne Bennett, by prematurely ending Dylan Browns rein as a first choice Eel, relegating the New Zealand representative 5/8 to minimum minutes and to playing Hooker, a master stroke in ensuring the Eels are best prepared for the future. Ryles stated in his presser "The future is now", indicating Dylan is now our history, we must find our future and what that looks like. There are not many NRL coaches out there that would put the future of the club, the direction of the club front and centre in this way. They are big calls, just like Gutherson, Reagan Campbell Gillard   Sivo, Lane and to a lesser but just as important Matterson and Cartwright, these decisions are huge, and go directly to repairing our salary cap our  club , our culture and the power bases that we're destroying the club through selfish player acts and behaviours through their managers, the leaking of contract negotiations, the embellishment of injuries, the ransoming behaviours chasing more $$ at negotiation times, to the detriment of the club and the fans. Jason Ryles deserves praise for his forward thinking and his desire to ensure a healthy future Eels club, he hasn't taken the easy way, the way most coach's would have gone about it. To me this shows we have someone special, someone that cares about our club long term and is not concerned about the easy path to look good right now, I think we may have found someone that just might drag us out of the bottom 8 mudpit.

I have had my concerns and I've voiced them loud and clear here, but this week has convinced me that Ryles is strong, not just a little bit in a few areas, I mean he is like superman strong in NRL coaching terms, every hard decision that was required to change our culture, change our ways and lay foundations for our future has been taken. Ryles is setting standards in stone, standards around contract negotiations , standards around fan engagement by players, standards on and off the field, it has been very very impressive.

We still sit near the bottom of the table and it's something that grinds on me terribly, to an outsider nothing has changed,to someone that wants instant success nothing has changed the reality though is much different, we are now seeing our future right before our eyes, the new systems on the field, fast footy, offloads, expansive plays at pace, at the moment they are coming with errors, errors galour, but like penrith the first 5 or 6 weeks this year they couldn't catch a ball, were running last and looked error prone, however once the polish was applied, their new players integrated we are seeing them make a run for finals and looking good doing it. Just like the Eels may very well look like next year, it's the polish that we are missing, the few more skilled players with pace, with football vision and the heart to buy into and trust the style of football Ryles wants us to play. Players like Addo Carr and Lomax are lacking the polish the trust to remain in formation, Hopgood is a confused and injured player questioning exactly what his role is. A few more players in the centres and forwards added to our squad next year in the Ryles mould of player will make all the difference. Ryles has built the foundations and set the standards, these are remarkable feats for a rookie coach especially a rookie coach thrown into an Eels club that was allowing players to have too much for too long without consequence. This has now been reversed.

'Ryles has chosen well in Iongi, a talent who trusts Ryles way of play our new addition of Da Silva looked slick, his passing crisp and fast, it's exciting to see the seeding of how we are to play, Dylan Walker as a ball playing lock is opening attacking possibilities by the bucketload. Throw in a little halfback called Moses next year and Ryles has some heart and soul to go with pace, skill and a plan to play attacking footy. Rylie Smith sums this up in the way he plays, dosnt stop, setting standards, tackling till he drops, heart on his sleeve. He wants to be here and he wants to be an Eel and it shows. If we need a heart beat in the 17 Rylie is first in line, a boy given no hope but through sheer determination he looks like a regular first grader, he puts a few on decent coin to shame. These blokes that play selfish that play slow, that play fatigued won't last long under Ryles, he won't stand for it, and i like that.

Ryles has won me over, there are just too many positives in the way he is correcting the club, from the foundations all the way up to our playing style. The way he is doing it demands future sustained success, not just a few little wins here and now, as a fan, I'm standing up and applauding him for his vision and his will and desire to turn us into the powerhouse club we have always wanted.

It is now time for the club to support him even further, it's time that they undertook and understand why we are unable to help Ryles by signing his first choice requests. We are turning to youth not just as  a policy but also as a consequence of not signing identified NRL talent. Young Joash is a prime example here. He is what we have, not what we actually want, but what we have. Ryles isn't going to sulk , he is going to give him the best oppurtunity to succeed, but there is still something amiss, something off, something that is not best practice, something that isn't working for us when it comes to negotiating and closing deals for talented in demand players. Ryles has thrown down the gauntlet, he has made the hard decisions, he has stood tall and proud of what he is attempting to accomplish, he understands what was needed and what had to change, he understood who had to go and who was to stay. Its time that the club help him out in the last bastion that is stopping us from becoming that powerhouse. The club must understand and improve how they negotiate and convince targeted players to become an Eel. Recent reports show how a night at Ivan Cleary's home in the backyard completely changed Blaize Talagi's mind on leaving the Eels last year. Another report shows how one conversation with Cameron Ciraldo changed Galvan's mind on his whole future. There are numerous reasons why players sign where they sign, I say it's time our club delves into what is holding us back , what are we not doing well and how we convince , cajole and nurture future players into signing with us. There has to be reasons, it's time to do like Ryles does and change the way we understand  and undertake this aspect of recruitment.

Ryles is leading the way, I think we finally have what we deserve , a coach that has no problems making the hard decisions, a coach that follows his path, a coach that cares about the club and its fans a coach that has shaken the soft foundations the soft underbelly of the club and replaced it with hard concrete. These foundations are setting us up to hold a powerhouse club. Ryles is a winner, he wants the club to be a winner and he is prepared to do what it takes exactly when it's needed, as Ryles says "The future is now"  and when you actually stop and really think what that means, it hits home.

I'm  impressed ! no actually I'm super impressed ! and to think this bloke is just a Rookie.