Time for the Eels to start taking some risks, starting with the new head coach

06/19/2024 12:56 PM

It's been a real stinker of a year to be a Parramatta Eels fan.

Hopes of returning to the finals this year have been dashed, the team sits at the bottom of the ladder after many frustrating and sometimes embarrassing losses and the club is no doubt still reeling from the trauma of sacking former coach Brad Arthur mid-season.

It's a decision I'm still really struggling to come to terms with, particularly because Arthur was sacked with no clear plan in place. I also struggled with the brutality of sacking a man who had brought the club back from the brink the day before his 50th birthday.

How did this happen?

This was Arthur's 11th year as coach. No matter which was you look at it, he as coming to the end of his tenure in the short-term future. My hope was that the club was aware of this, thinking about succession planning and who would take the reins next.

All so the transition could be done in a way that showed respect for the services that Arthur and his family had given this club.

It's clear that there was no succession plan in place and in fact, the decision to go after Wayne Bennett feels like a 'hail Mary' right at the end.

Why did the Eels decide to extend Arthur last year? Why wasn't Bennett spoken to last year when it was common knowledge that he was off contract with the Dolphins at the end of this year? Was Arthur sacked because Mitch Moses got injured?

The club should learn plenty from this process. I think a lot of how the club approached this issue and a lot of Parra’s challenges stem back to the salary cap saga in 2016.

When catastrophes hit organisations, they are left reeling and my club was no different. But in response to that crisis plenty of positive has come in how the club is run; including stability.

From a governance perspective there is more certainty about how our directors are selected and the type of people who should sit on a board – we remain a tight-lipped club which suggests trust throughout the organisation and then on the field there have been finals runs and a new Centre of Excellence which is almost complete.

But after you go through a crisis like that, sometimes you become a little bit risk averse and a little more cautious. I think we saw that in how the club treated Arthur including how long he stayed at the club. Perhaps that's also why an approach to Bennett wasn't made earlier, the Eels were playing it safe to care for Arthur's feelings or to see if he could pull a rabbit out a hat this year.

And then the Rabbitohs pulled Bennett back to them from under the Eels’ noses.

You can also see it in the club's recruitment processes, which have been painted in the media to be slow and cumbersome. If things aren't moving fast enough, that perhaps points to a culture which is a little nervous to take risks.

The key question now is who should be the next coach at Parramatta? Reports earlier this week suggest that the short list is down to Jason Ryles and Josh Hannay. As long as Trent Barrett is off that short list, I'm already feeling more comfortable.

I don't know much about either, but a rookie coach is a risk. Perhaps it's time that Parramatta starting taking a few more of those.

Given that there was no successor announced immediately, the club executives have a great opportunity here to think about their culture and to select a coach that will buy into that and ensure there is strong connection between front office and the football team.

There's also an opportunity to make sure that the club as a whole is considered. The Eels have an NRLW team now and it would be fantastic to see greater integration between the men's and women's team and see a coach who really leans in and supports that part of the club.

But none of the above really matters if Parramatta's approach to recruitment changes.

Our roster is problematic, particularly when it comes to the number of outside backs. Daejarn Asi is not a centre, but he is close to one of the only options the club has right now, which is frightening.

This isn't a new problem last either; the Eels had similar challenges last year when players were injured and suspended. It's clear that while Parramatta might not have been their best on the field that they weren't set up for success off it with an incomplete and unbalanced roster.

The salary cap saga is long behind us. The key is that the club has systems, processes and reporting in place to make sure that the club never finds itself in a situation like that again.

It's time for the next evolution in the club's culture and that is the taking of smart and calculated risks.

The first of those risks will be announcing the new head coach – I hope it's a risk that pays off.