As we transition with our rebuilding phase, I'm wondering if we have gone about it the wrong way around.
We have a great Home ground, we have great fans that will support the club, we have a world class training centre, we have the new constitution and Leagues Club to rival most others, We have the shiny new coach and assistant coach's, and we have a world class Halfback, with a new culture developing.
It appears that we have been checking off for some time all the ingredients required to have a winning club. This brings me to what I see as a major fault within our club.
It appears we are able to identify the players we wish to sign, there are many examples of that within our system right now, none better then Iongi, Lomax, Addo Carr and Walker. However there also appears to be a problem with getting classy players that are being courted by other teams over the line and sigining with our club. The 4 players I mentioned were not being courted by any other club.
So how do we fix it. If we are identifying where the club was falling behind with all of the above and we set about turning it around and fixing it, to the boards credit, then surely the same Board can see we are seriously lacking in the art of getting a quality player that other clubs want to join our squad.
What is it that is lacking in this area. Is it a lack of understanding of what makes the player tick, are possible recruits issues, fears, not being addressed during the negotiations, is it a stigma that players don't like our club, Is it the rookie coach might not be good, is it a lack of third party deals or investment clubs etc. Do the player managers not get on with our club. There must be something that is turning off potential recruits. Over the last couple of years we have lost so many players and potential coach's for that matter, that the club has identified as wanting or wanting to keep, and we havnt been able to get them accross the line.
So I do wonder who at our club is identifying the problem, and what needs to be done to turn this around. Over the next 12 months, we as a club have a huge war chest of salary cap $$ to be spent, but it won't matter if the club cannot sign the good 1st choice players they are targeting.
It makes me wonder, what our club would look like if we were to recruit say Gus Gould. Would that even be possible. I do wonder what type of $$ would it take to hire someone like him. We seem to be very light on in the reputation and signing power of our current head of football. I'd happily pay Gus Gould $2m a season to be our recruitment spokesperson, the man that makes the deal, that courts the new player. Surely someone of his experience and stature would be a crucial and club defining signing. Perhaps the very last piece of the Eels puzzle.
Im no fan of Mark O'Neill head of football operations, I have made that very clear. So how do we get the club to at least review what mistakes have been made or continue to be made that turns so many players away from us.
I think it's crucial for any future success, more so then any one player. We should be going for the best of the best people out there to be working on our contract negotiations and selling our vision to new recruit prospects. We search high and low for the best layers, then why don't we do that at Boss level, at management level.
Im not sure of whom we should even target if we were to replace Mark O'Neill, but i am of the strongest opinion that the club to move forward must as a matter of urgency delve very deep into what is going wrong at this level, and fix it. We have an oppurtunity with our war chest to really go after some serious talent right now,
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But Longfin we played a grandfinal in 2022 and promptly lost players to other teams, and havnt been able to sign a top player when other clubs are in the race as well, that makes me wonder if it's the "Grandfinal" issue or not. Admittedly we didn't win one, but we were there, surely some of the players could see on the field we were playing above our weight.
I'm sure it has some element of truth, I do wonder if there is more though.
That Grand Final sort of came out of nowhere, and like previous successes it quickly fell away. That's what we need to change. We need to be top 4 or thereabouts every year. Success breeds success and if we can get up the ladder and stay there, players will come, without a doubt. Of course we need people who can do the paperwork, but we're not privy to what goes on in the front office and need to hope the club has this covered.
I don't think 22 came out of nowhere we had been to the finals the previous 3 years beforehand so they did build into getting into that position.The issue was we just didn't know how to win the big game and were outclassed by the best team of this current era.Which is no shame.
What happend 23-24 we rested on our laurels and made some poor coaching and recruitment and retention decisions you throw in injury to key players and all of a sudden we got exposed badly.
The issue I have now do we no how to get back to where we were and if we do are we setup across the board well enough to run with the best in the comp consistently.The next 2 years will tell a story.
One fascinating thing i want to bring up is the reported story of Isaac Moses calling Jason Ryles to say if Parramatta offer more money you get him, Ryles said no then Moses called Matthew Beach who reiterated what Ryles said.
Why ring Beach and not MON or Sarantinos? Unless they were included but wouldn't that be included in the report?
Im more of the thought as if we had no chance and this was a done deal why were our officials so confident they had a shot at Galvin that's the question I ask.
Everyone round here seems to think Vella was the deciding factor but yet our front office officials were reported as being very confident Friday night.
I mean are the reports BS as I'm sure we knew Vella was in there corner and did we think the money offered was the point of differencei don't know.
The manager was wearing two hats Coryn, surely you can see that, we were being played. Yes you can feel like a fool when that happens, but mostly you cannot change mid stream.
Deal making is common in anything, politics especially.
You could write a story on this one from when it was hatched through to fruition.
I just hope Gus was not being specifically demeaning to us and we were just the carriage in the ride.
One thing beginning to emerge is that it has become so obvious from a media perspective, it has the potential to blow the Dogs season apart and potentially ruin Galvin's career, at least the start of it.
Parramatta in the most subtle way should let it be known that the cicumstances leave such a bad taste they would be withdrawing their offer even if Galvin has not completed his contract and grabbing Sandon Smith's signature as soon as possible. Smith only wants a year (apparently). Go in big, we get to negotiate again in 12 months, he is keeping his options open by seeing what the West offers (WA). He will be cheaper than Galvin and Brown, and we can pay up if he performs and probably no more than what they were earning if they stayed with Parra. Win Win is always my motto in a corporate plan!
I don't have confidence at the moment that the Eels can get a deal done on a talented player if another club enters the race. If another team wants Sandon, are we even a chance.
Getting played in a 2 horse race isn't a great look if there were multiple teams and multiple balls up in the air then ok.But basically what there saying is his HS coach pretty much was the difference.Gus and co didn't have to go back to the table and off more they just took there shot.
Were we dillusional to enter this race much like the Bennett saga we're we dillusional there too.Time to move on but I used a baseball analogy earlier whose our closer.
It doesn't matter, going to the biggest boss is common in many businesses LB. What it does prove though is that MON is not a decision maker in these processes. Something I been trying to get through you guys for a long time, remember me blogging about his title being wrong ie General Manager Football is misleading. HEAD OF FOOTBALL is fine in a sense of managing the building, but the decorating and furnishing is directed and done by a higher echelon.
So in your iteration are you just saying MoN is a glorified pen pusher and that's it Pops a paper weight of soughts who has no opinion around recruitment or decisions or thoughts about it.
If this is the case like your saying why not just hire a poster model at least those making the decisions have something good to look at.I'd suggest Hayley Davies I'm sure she'd close deals I'm sure of it 😂.
Youll understand when you see a pic of her.
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