Eels Blogs

I have had time to marinate in it, at first i was furious, not at Barrett but the fact it led to BA's future being decided before the season ended as we could finish off poorly. Anyway, seems now BA is here for 2023, he has a contract he has a right to be. Season still to go, we could finish as high as 4th and low as 9th so we will see what BA can do. But what i will say is last year this same topic arose, BA should be gone why is he staying and i brought up after the Penrith semi that the club either sack him or extend him as nothing good comes out of a coach being off contract, i suggested giving a one year extension til 2023, but they added 2024 so be it. Then people mentioned well if you are going to keep him he should have new voices with assistants, he brought in new voices in Ennis and McGregor but his right hand men in Kidwell and Murphy remained the same, annoying some including myself, Ennis and McGregor were new voices but not sure on their influence as Ennis wouldn't be there everyday. Now it seems new people are coming in which can be a step in the right direction, Kidwell is gone and now it seems Murphy might be too with Carr and Barrett running the attack. A season too late? perhaps but hey if he is staying at least he is trying to change things.

The positive out of this is Barrett is a great assistant. Leading Penrith's attack in 2020 to being dominant. Leaving to Canterbury which was career suicide in terms of head coaching, now content assisting a team to greatness. When Ciraldo's name popped up i said i would like him to hire Barrett as he has worked with him and he is a quality attacking coach. Our attack is, well put it lightly inconsistently decent, quite predictable as Murphy was main attacking coach since Gentle left in 2018, he shared it with Gentle from 2014 to 2018. The crossfield kick on last tackle to the back-rowers, despite having tall wingers, crash balls and short ball to our edges is same old especially when falling behind. Not saying it hasn't worked but not consistently enough. Barrett and Carr will overhaul our attack.

Some will say here "Carr has been an assistant for some of the year and no changes" Well how can he change things in half a year? It is bloody difficult to do. Carr will work in the off-season to revamp the attack the way he and Barrett want to. I think Barrett will be the orchestrator but Carr will pitch in and work with the backs as Barrett works with the halves and spine. I also believe Carr will work alonside BA more as Barrett works on attack, hopefully another assistant like Madge will work on defence and Carr will look between both and give feedback to BA and sit behind him, i think Carr could be a nice transistion coach post BA and what better way to get ready than being alongside him day in day out.

So is Barrett hire good? Well no matter who the coach is it should be seen as a great hire, the thing that annoyed me and petty of me at the time was it meant BA is staying well before we know how this season that has been disappointing was going to end. But if BA gives up the leads on defence and sits back and relies on assistants alot more with Barrett and Madge who have had head coaching experience compared to Kidwell and Murphy, hopefully he can focus on our mentality and attitude putting more focus on that than juggling defence and overseeing the team.

Defence is our most important area to improve and hopefully Madge talks mean we are not done with hiring assistants. Madge would be nice addition for defence, BA will still have finger prints over it as in the past we have had a top 5 defence for many years it was attack that was our issue, Kidwell leaving could have had a massive effect in that BA took more responsibility in the defence taking his time away from head coach responsibilities. Plus who's to say Kidwell and BA did not have a falling out and it led to divide on our defence early on?

I guess i am playing devil's advocate in that BA is more likely here for 2023, we have to support him, give him credit for changing it up compared to Murphy who was here for 9 years. Barrett is new and so will be Carr who will have more say. Defence is next, Madge looked at and hopefully some others. My personal choice would be Seibold as he is a genius in defence (not head coaching) and Neil Henry is the same too but Seibold has stayed in the game recently so his ideas are more inclined to NRL today.

Could we bow out in week 1 or miss the 8? Possibly. If that happens could they still sack BA and keep Barrett around as an assistant for the new coach? I mean it has happened before and Barrett is an attractive assistant for many coaches so it is a possibility. But if BA is our coach, support him, well for first bit of 2023 at least to see how we are going, it is not 100% he is staying as weirder things have happened but seems nearly 100% he is here so we have to deal with it and hope for the best.

Side note: I wonder what that whole thing about BA and Canterbury came from, at first we thought deep down BA and his management knew this could be it for him, but BA been plotting to have Barrett since way before that news broke. Now of course we can say just a media beat up, but let's be fair media rarely come up with stuff that is 100% false. Can they overexaggerate? Yes, definately. But they never say something out of thin air, there is something where it comes from. So yeah that is a thread that will be left undone for the future and it is not really relevant anyway, just a side note that is weird.