Stacey Jones shares advice with Shaun Johnson at Warriors training. Photo / Getty Images
Stacey Jones shares advice with Shaun Johnson at Warriors training. Photo / Getty Images
OPINION:
It's easy to kick someone when they're down. Easy to wade in with the boot after they've been subjected to week-in and week-out abuse.
The Warriors have put their fanbase through the mangler recently, wringing every last ounce of joy out of them as the season has wound relentlesslyon.
If you get treated like that, it's natural to lash out in anger. To blamestorm your way through the club.
From the players (who look incapable of playing as a unit), to the coach (whose message was wrong or ineffectual), to the CEO (with whom the buck should stop), to the owner (because he's an easy target), everyone is in the gun. Everyone.
This week's game is identifying a target for everyone to point their finger at.
Yesterday, the easiest donkey on whom to pin the loser's tail was ushered off to the abattoir. A stoic effort, an effort under duress, but an effort that was so incredibly loaded with conjecture, the mule's back broke. Nathan Brown became the latest in a long list of Warriors coaches who have tried and failed to lead the team to the promised land.
Coach Nathan Brown is cutting short his time with the Warriors. Photo / Getty Images
It's the continuum of the NRL: Blame the coach. Sack the coach. Find another coach. Praise the coach as the saviour. Watch the coach's proverbial hit the fan. Blame the coach...
Somewhere in that loop something has to change dramatically. It normally doesn't.
This is because the NRL is an extraordinarily tough competition - you don't fluke the trophy of two blokes hugging. It's damn hard. The best teams with the best coaches still get embarrassed.
The best coaches who have everything in their favour. They coach in their own country. Their team play at home. They have the support of home, of fans, of family. They have teams beneath their first-grade side to bring players through. They have a home judiciary. Home referees.
But these coaches still lose. And lose horribly. Trent Barrett and Michael Maguire have met a similar fate to Brown. Ricky Stewart, a long and varied career, isn't looking great right now. Justin Holbrook and Adam O'Brien are on thin ice.
It's a rare individual that can deliver consistent success on the NRL stage. Craig Bellamy, Trent Robinson, Wayne Bennett have achieved what eludes most - consistent success.
Reece Walsh and his Warriors teammates have had a poor run of results. Photo / Getty Images
Success built on solid foundations. Success unfettered by extraordinary circumstances such as the curious situation the Warriors have found themselves in.
I doubt any of those top coaches could achieve what they have under the unique pressures to which this club has been exposed.
This is not to accept the mediocre servings of the past three seasons, merely to accentuate the stresses that the Warriors have been under.
A new coach won't solve the woes of the club. Stacey Jones won't ride in on a stallion and save the day. From his comments he doesn't want to. Wise decision.
The buck stops with the owner and the man who runs his club. The future success of the Warriors lies solely with them and their ability to rebuild an organisation beaten from pillar to post by circumstances some of which are beyond their control, and some very much in their control.
Sort that out and the new man in charge might have a starter's chance when the Warriors finally come home.
