Penrith have managed to bring a lot of juniors through continuously year after year, but this year have group of quality players bought through junior ranks that now hitting rep level with help of few key signings. Despite having classy juniors before I don't believe they have had such large group with equal quality of current group for a long time.
It took Gould as a football director and helping out with coaching and recruitment to achieve this and still it has taken longer than his 5 year plan to set solid base for this success. Penrith haven't had a diabolical year compared to parra current situation but have underperformed during this period and had calls for mass changes and even Gould sacking. But look at them now. They got rid of local and loved players and even booted Ivan cleary to freshen up the team. Would penrith still have success they having now if cleary was in charge. We won't know but sometimes teams and clubs need a change. Do we need similar changes or with better support can BA be leader we need? Anthony Griffin has been labeled the most likely coach be sacked first for majority of years coaching yet led broncos to finals and has penrith flying this year so is BA capable of similar turnaround.
Compare penrith to parra and BA started couple years after Gould joined penrith and inherited a team in a far worse position with core group of average juniors at parra who as pointed out in previous blog dominated younger grades due to size and physicality but little heart and skill where few have succeeded even when at other clubs. Meanwhile the players penrith got rid of have been successful elsewhere (except Cartwright the cat) yet still replaced them with even better players.
Throw in the salary cap scandal at parra, the club in administration and lack football manager over seeing things and easy to see why parra is where it is.
People want a Gould or Brian Smith to be footy director which I don't argue with but do we keep BA as coach. As I said penrith booted cleary and are now enjoying success but would that success have occurred if Cleary stayed. We just don't know but I believe they would have but due to fan pressure after bad season he was the scapegoat. He has proven he can coach and assemble a squad but paid price for a bad year.
Now what would a BA side look like without the salary cap scandal, club in administration and knowledgeable football manager helping out. I pretty sure we wouldn't be last. With good footy manager making decisions on assistant staff to assist BA in shortfalls he is unable to see himself such as a dedicated halves coach, attacking coach, sports psychologist and better strength and conditioning which has failed us this year with the AFL trainer we would improve out of site. If the reason we don't have them is because BA cant work with others he needs to go now. A good footy manager would also provide voice and view when things not working which would be huge plus side for the club going forward if BA man enough accept the help
If we get rid of BA I will understand as under current results not many coaches keep their job. That said we need take few things into account.
When talking about juniors coming through, player retention and new signings I am not sure they are reasons to sack him. The salary cap meant we lost junior and peats which are arguably our 2 positions we need to strengthen most. He also started at disadvantage first couple years with club still paying players to play elsewhere and player managers blackmailing the club.
He bought watmough, foran and Evans and they stand as his 3 biggest failures yet most involved in league and most fans said all were good signings at the time but they all turned bad very quickly. Sometimes even before they wore the eels jersey their form dropped for their current side after signing with us and lead to the told you so brigade claiming they knew all along they were bad buys despite real hype at time of signing. There were exemptions to the false hype however very few predicted how messy they would all would turn out.
Another fact that is forgotten is the effect of the salary cap drama and forced administration of club who have set rules in the administration which may fly in direct contrast of what is best for the football club and it's success.
I don't carry on about connections like others here but take it as fact some player managers won't send players to parra despite what is said during negotiations, leaked to the media and so called experts on forums like this. The club have also been ignored when sounding out players hence why some think we have not chased some players despite doing so only to be given ridiculous price so we go no further then discrete enquiry.
We have been used by certain managers to drive price up of players but after cap scandal they won't touch parra till heat dies down and illegal TPAs flow again.
Lastly the fact no juniors coming through which is major issue for some point to damage done prior to BA as well. The youngsters who have come through since he started are about hit grade now. Judge juniors from next year onwards or if players get start in remainder of this year. Just like in penrith it takes a good 5 years to get structure and systems in place to bring though talent from juniors if system is broken hence Goulds 5 year plan.
So does BA deserve to be booted. Most likely due solely on results. However I would give him benefit of doubt on recruitment due to reasons out of his hands. He needs help not even ‘‘unicorns’’ can deny that but I would give him and team set number of games to win this year and prove they are worth keeping. If this is the case we need have back up ready to roll hence why I think the maquire link to footy manager role.
We have a lot of players on last year contract as well but problem is we may leave it too late to replace them if we give them all till rest of year as chance to prove themselves. We need make decision on players now and make new signings if possible given the club situation with some player managers.
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The difference between Parramatta and Penrith is that whilst Cleary was coach most of the current crop of juniors had already had couple of years in the NRL.
Parramatta on the other hand under Brad hasn't even started debuing juniors. So if it's taken 6 years @ Penrith, we're looking at 2024 before we reap the benifits.
Are you willing to wait until 2024 with Brad who has debut one development players since 2016? The only jnr i can see having a major impact atm is Kaufusi. The others will be hit and miss.
And don't forget like ive said before our Junior situation was in decent shape on Arthur's arrival with Holbrook taking our 20s deep into the finals in 2014. So those who say our Junior situation was in disarray are full of shait.
Wentworthville aren't exactly stacked full of junior ready for the call up. They are also being resoundingly beaten every week - 4 from the bottom. They aren't exactly choc full of development players pushing for the NRL.
Look at the debuts penrith have made over past 2-3 years. On top of that I started by saying penrith have continued to debut couple juniors every year for a long period. Gus joined penrith few years before BA arrived unless I am wrong on that and their junior progression has improved immensely in last few years with better quality and quantity of numbers stepping up. Why then would it take us another 6 years. Juniors who were 14 or 15 when BA started are now around 20 and should be close to debut or year or 2 off for other players as he should have refined the flow of information to junior coaches. Identifying junior talent shouldn't be the nrl coaches job. However setting up systems to develop players to help them learn style and requirements of nrl squad should be filtered down to juniors through the coaches starting with the NRL head coach. That is why I am interested in players debuting this year or next. That would have given BA time to get his coaching handprint on players coming through his system.
NRL coaches only identify players for the nrl squad or players just off nrl standard and should not be responsible for all juniors. This is a specialist position in which parra has failed in recent years but in no way is BA fault.
Another reason we need good footy manager to identify and fix this issue.
In recent story it was written Nikuore was identified by BA. That is 1 junior player identified and debuted by him in recent years. If he wasn't happy with progression of our juniors I would have expected more outside purchases of players close to a debut. This has not happened and can definetly be blamed on BA but the whole junior development is not his fault. Our younger grades went well last year across the board and all stepped up probably playing a year ahead of themselves now affecting results. You also have to realise when players hit state cup or 20s level BA may have had word to wenty or junior coaches about certain players and what they need to work on. That may involve switching their positions to give them more skills or better understanding of the game. It may also mean some attacking players concentrate more on defence so although appearing to go backwards are actually improving for needs of nrl player, hence my opinion to wait a year to judge him.
If we can debut 4 or 5 quality players in the next year or 2 we wouldn't be far behind the penrith timeline despite all our setbacks and lack of quality staff which as pointed out below Gus pinched some.
Do I think we will debut 5 quality juniors probably not but I don't know enough about the juniors being based in qld so rely on info on here which is about as reliable as poor Peni Terepos hands.
Just on the youngsters coming through FM, we've obviously had Marata debut who may be starting this week due to Tep's suspension.
In the next 12 months I can also see the debuts of Mahoney, Stone and Salmon and possibly Leleisiuao if he remains fit. Of that group, three have come up through our grades and we poached Salmon from Cronulla.
I share the same view as Phil. BA gets one season (2019) to prove this year is an aberration. If not, he's moved on.
There.are many reasons as have been stated previously, mainly relating to recruitment
He should be sacked because the first state of origin is about to be played and we have won two games this year - simple as that.
He could have debuted all the juniors in the world and signed 5 internationals - it doesn't matter - the ultimate measure is wins - or at least competitiveness.
The club is in the business of winning games of rugby league - surely they can't continue with a coach that can't find a win to save himself. How he got to this point is now pretty much irrelevant.
There were 7000 at ANZ last Saturday ffs. In rugby league terms this is a crisis situation.
He has to be replaced - surely.
I agree with the last part of your comment. Our track record ain't good.
Hindburt, I'm not sure how i forgot to include you as a starting playerfor the Unicorn team
Hindburt actually should be included in the Unicorn immortal class , there's absolutely no doubt about it
I hope your happy with the season so far. Tell us all what ba has up his sleeve for 2019?
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