Here is a summary of a Foxsport article dated today. A recommended read.
It's not unusual to see Jason Ryles passionately banging on the windows of the coaching box during a game open-palmed.
Ryles’ first season at Parramatta has been anything but quiet. The rookie coach took on one of the NRL’s toughest jobs, dreaming of ending a 39-year title drought. He turned the club upside down.
His baptism was brutal. In round one the Eels were smashed 56-18 by Craig Bellamy’s Storm.
“It was a Mike Tyson moment, ‘everyone’s got a plan until you get punched in the face’,” admitted CEO Jim Sarantinos. “But he stayed true to the plan.”
That plan was speed. “Speed, agility and quickness were the focus,” explained general manager Mark O’Neill.
The purge has been staggering. Out the door went former long-time Captain Gutherson, Campbell-Gilllard, Maika Sivo, Ryan Matterson, Shaun Lane, Bryce Cartwright, Joe Ofahengaue, Matt Arthur and Brendan Hands all gone. Dylan Brown stunned the game with a 10-year move to Newcastle. In came Jack Williams, Isaiah Iongi, Joash Papalii and Josh Addo-Carr. Players who could sharpen Parramatta’s attack. If Bailey Simonsson departs, only Mitchell Moses, Junior Paulo and Will Penisini will remain from the 2022 grand final side.
“Most of that turnover will have happened in 12 months,” Sarantinos said.
Ryles has shown steel with individuals too, dropping Brown mid-year while declaring “our future is now.”
Mentor Eddie Jones (above right) knows Ryles well. “He can be really calm, and then he can be at it. But then he can settle down, then break a walkie talkie or radio, and then he’s at it again. That sums him up.”
“He’s that big sort of goofy bloke out of Wollongong (persona), a knockabout. But as he showed during his own career, he has a massive determination to make it."
“He’s bright, mate. Super bright. He doesn’t come across like that, but he’s very intuitive and can read a room. Players like coaches who can make them better. If they can strike a likeness about them, it’s even better. Correct them with care, like Rylesy can do, they immediately fit in.”
Despite missing the finals, the mood is optimistic. “He has made a lot of change, not just personnel, but in the way he wanted the team to play,” Sarantinos said.
“At the start of the season, we said, ‘we need to be playing better in the second half of the season than what we do in the first half of the season’. I think you’ve seen that.”
And the sight of Ryles hammering the glass in the coaches’ box has become symbolic.
“I love it,” Sarantinos laughed. “He just wears his heart on his sleeve.”
Replies
That's a great read.
Great read. Love JRs honesty and hope he has enjoyed his year with us. Im really disappointed it's almost over after wishing the year ended three games in haha
love he lets the players play!
Yep, he is shaping as something special....I love the intuititive intelligence
It seperates the gunna's from to the doer's.
Eelawarra, that was a pretty special post....congrats!
Hey Jim why did you bother chasing Wayne and Craig 😂
Of course your laughing now.
Maybe it was Sean who was the driver to get the first mentioned.
That's unfair Coryn. Hindsight can be terrible when looking in the rear vision mirror, but you have to make original decisions with foresight and take the rear vision as it happens.
Nobody thought that Ryles was going to be that good at the interview stage, so why not chase who you can get up to a final decision.
Josh Hannay was a contender, he coaches Titans next year maybe the greatest thing since sliced bread......and makes Ryles look like a mug. If that did happen doesn't mean we did the wrong thing at the time!