Sack Seibold Immediately

[Highflier]

Tooves wasn't a failure. His worst finish was ninth.

Barrett was a failure.

Des was more successful than Seibs and a pass considering he dealt with covid and had us tracking to make the finals for the fourth time in four years before we self imploded.

Seibs is a failure.

your right we have to remember before the self inflicted wound of Jersey gate we were tracking pretty well in 7th or 8th I think ,so who knows where we would have finished the year if not for that own goal, again thank you Penn !!! I also still dont know what Tooves did that was so bad that he got shafted after such a short tenure and was only 2 forward passes from a deserved yet ultimately stolen GF win !!!
I feel sometimes (in hindsight ofcourse) ,that every string pulled by Penn has quickly been revealed to be the wrong one .

 

[Ron E. Gibbs]

Barrett , can’t remember but would have brought in people loyal to him , no great changes in players , failure.

You're forgetting the Great Bozo Rebuild of 2015 that accompanied the Barrett signing, which was hailed by the media as a masterstroke and delivered… sweet FA.

Remember this, from December, 2015?

How Dylan Walker signing completed Bob Fulton’s incredible overhaul of Manly Sea Eagles

by Ben Glover from Fox Sports

IN April this year Manly legend Bob Fulton returned to the club as a consultant.

What has transpired since from a recruitment point-of-view will go down as one of the most incredible turnarounds in rugby league history, with the Dylan Walker signing, confirmed overnight, likely to be the last piece of business the Sea Eagles do on their roster for 2016.

Manly are now fifth favourite with bookmakers to win the 2016 premiership.

Remarkable to think then that when the man they call Bozo first got his feet under the table less than nine months ago Manly were a club going only one way ... and that was down.

After an outrageously successful decade the Sea Eagles were facing up to the consequences of some heavily backended deals brokered when Des Hasler was coach to keep their group of two-time premiership champions together.

It started in 2014, when things got so bad from a salary cap perspective that Manly weren’t even able to offer fan favourite and Clive Churchill Medallist Glenn Stewart any kind of new deal.

If they did they were certain to lose champion halves Daly Cherry-Evans and Kieran Foran.

As it turned out, they did anyway. Along with another Clive Churchill Medallist Brent Kite, Origin star Anthony Watmough and retiring co-captain Jason King.

It’s fair to say when Bozo first took a look at the books the club was staring down the barrel of a long rebuild.

The best they could hope for was a Phil Gould-style five year (which has since been revised to eight year) plan.

But Fulton decided there and then that Manly wouldn’t be going down that path. The club was too used to success to have a sustained period of failure, no matter how it was branded.

That’s when things started to move.

THE SIGNINGS

May: Just a few weeks after Bozo arrived, Kangaroos star Nate Myles announced he would be moving to the northern beaches.

Firebrand forward Darcy Lussick was next, sealing his return to the Sea Eagles after a three-year stint with Parramatta.

June: With the future of the forward pack starting to look more promising, Manly landed the blow that would turn the narrative around for the club.

Having lost gun halfback Cherry-Evans to the Titans, the superstar announced he would renege on the deal taking him to the glitter strip, instead inking a “lifetime deal” with the Sea Eagles that would make him the highest paid player in the competition.

Kiwi international Lewis Brown was next as the trickle of stars heading to Manly turned into a torrent.

Brown joined the Sea Eagles amidst a flurry of speculation that Trent Barrett had been lined up to replace the under pressure Geoff Toovey.

While Barrett’s arrival wasn’t confirmed until months later, the Penrith connections started piling up.

July: The pack was starting to come together but with Matt Ballin ageing, the hooker position was still a concern for Fulton.

Three months after rejoining the Sea Eagles, Bozo landed a double blow with the signings of Panthers hooker Apisai Koroisau and Brisbane young gun Matt Parcell.

August: Manly’s 2016 side was starting to come together but with Foran heading to Parramatta, the five-eighth position was the biggest area of concern.

That problem area was targeted with a number of signings, starting with the astute recruitment of schoolboy rugby star Tom Wright who was given star treatment at Brookvale during the courtship.

Still so young, Wright was never going to be the solution for 2016, and at about the same time, Manly took their biggest recruitment gamble by throwing a career lifeline to injury prone Tigers utility Tim Moltzen, with a one-year deal and the opportunity to stake a claim on the No.6 jersey.

September: With Moltzen and Jamie Lyon the only obvious options to play five-eighth, Fulton struck again bringing in Manly’s third Penrith recruit Isaac John, another player with Test pedigree.

October: At the end of the 2015 season, Manly started to have success offloading some of the players Fulton had earmarked for the scrapheap.

As the departures started to pile up to match the arrivals, the Sea Eagles went again, landing their crowning jewell of the off-season spending spree when the Tigers agreed to release powerhouse Kiwi Marty Taupau.

Taupau’s signing added brute power to what was already shaping as a competitive forward pack. It was at this point that the Sea Eagles’ rebuild went from a project to a success that could bear immediate fruit in 2016.

December: In reality this happened in November but Manly had to wait for the Rabbitohs to confirm a release and for a bit more salary cap space to open up before they could announce the signing of Dylan Walker.

Walker is yet another player capped at Test level. He has x-factor and is still just 21. If the Sea Eagles backline was losing its fear factor there can be no one questioning that it’s back now.

Walker is set to move into the troublesome five-eighth role, providing a frightening running threat next to the scheming of Cherry-Evans.

THE DEPARTURES

Back in July as Fulton’s recruitment blueprint started to unfold, it emerged that a whopping 14 players had been told they were unwanted for 2016. Some of them had multi-year contracts to run.

The players named at that time were: Justin Horo, Dunamis Lui, Jack Littlejohn, Willie Mason, David Williams, Cheyse Blair, Siosaia Vave, Tyson Andrews, Matt Ballin, Jayden Hodges, Josh Starling, Luke Burgess and Feleti Mateo.

Just four of those (Hodges, Starling, Burgess and Mateo) 14 remain Sea Eagles, with Peta Hiku eventually added to the list and shipped to the Panthers.

The four who remain will be playing for their careers in 2016 and are more likely than not to be elsewhere the following season as the transition continues.

It’s a remarkable turnover of any list but of all of those players told to leave the only ones who would be in the conversation for Manly’s best 17 next year are Ballin, Hiku and perhaps Mateo.

That in itself is remarkable and points to the fact that Fulton has got it right and made incredibly savvy decisions on the future of the roster.

THE COACHING STAFF

Not only has half Manly’s roster been turned over since Fulton arrived, just about all of the coaching staff now on deck are new faces as well.

Fulton was one of the senior members of staff to decide Toovey’s fate and when that difficult decision was made most of the backroom staff went with the club legend.

While the roster turnover has been widely applauded, the fans and the broader public will be more reserved in their judgement of the coaching staff.

Immediate results are required to convince but while Barrett is new to the coaching game, the results of his senior staff members speak for themselves.

John Cartwright was this year an assistant coach to Paul Green at the premiership winning Cowboys and has eight years experience as head coach for the Titans.

Former Storm assistant coach Anthony Siebold has forged a career under Craig Bellamy and will be in charge of Manly’s defence in 2016.

And head of physical performance Dan Ferris has a growing reputation in the game after starting his career under Cartwright at the Titans and also linking up with the Country Origin side.

Cartwright and Siebold take over from the highly respected David Penna and Steve Georgallis, while halves coach and rugby league legend Andrew Johns has also been let go.

Ferris takes over from a veteran of the Manly backroom staff, Donny Singe, completing one of the most stunning spring cleans an NRL club has taken on in years.

SEA EAGLES LIKELY 2016 17: Brett Stewart, Jorge Taufua, Steve Matai, Jamie Lyon, Tom Trbojevic, Dylan Walker, Daly Cherry-Evans, Nate Myles, Apisai Koroisau, Jake Trbojevic, Lewis Brown, Jamie Buhrer, Marty Taupau. Interchange: Matt Parcell, Darcy Lussick, Brenton Lawrence, Tom Symonds.

Oh, and look who was brought in as our defensive "genius"!

 

[Cliffycomeback]

your right we have to remember before the self inflicted wound of Jersey gate we were tracking pretty well in 7th or 8th I think ,so who knows where we would have finished the year if not for that own goal, again thank you Penn !!! I also still dont know what Tooves did that was so bad that he got shafted after such a short tenure and was only 2 forward passes from a deserved yet ultimately stolen GF win !!!
I feel sometimes (in hindsight ofcourse) ,that every string pulled by Penn has quickly been revealed to be the wrong one .

Power tripping decisions perhaps? They have a much higher likelihood of blowing up.

 

[Ron E. Gibbs]

Here's another masterpiece in blowing Bob Fulton's trumpet (or just blowing Bob Fulton) by Paul Crawley in June 2017:

Manly’s Bob Fulton shows how to go about an NRL rebuild

RECRUITING the resurgent Akuila Uate is just one of the many smart deals Bob Fulton has done since he returned to Manly. PAUL CRAWLEY analyses Manly’s amazing rebuild.

BOB Fulton is not a fan of seeing his name in the paper, so I’d better turn off my phone today.
But given he didn’t say our chat was off the record, I thought I’d pass on some of it.

This is not about Fulton blowing his own trumpet. This is about giving a 69-year-old rugby league Immortal his share of credit for this amazing Manly rebuild.

It got me thinking this week when I saw Akuila Uate was up against his former club Newcastle for the first time tomorrow night.

Uate is back in the type of form that made him a NSW and Australian Test winger.

The irony is the Knights are still paying about half Uate’s wage.

But before we tell you about how that deal came about, let’s tell you a story I was told many years ago.

This goes to the core of what’s happening at the Sea Eagles today.

Fulton has always had his knockers, mainly because of his success, and the fact he doesn’t suffer fools.

But at one point even Wayne Bennett had reservations about working with him.
This is going back to just after the Super League war ended in the late 1990s. Bennett had been appointed Australian coach and one of the things he was said to be apprehensive about was working with Fulton.

That was until they sat down and talked footy.

Bennett later rated Fulton one of the three best judges of rugby league talent he had worked with.

The two others were Don Furner senior and the old Brisbane Broncos recruitment genius Cyril Connell.

All these years later, it’s obvious Fulton hasn’t lost his nous.

But when Manly first signed Uate, my initial response was probably much the same as yours. Why?

Fulton laughed and said: “Rugby league is like riding a bike.”
Then he told me about the first time he spotted Uate playing under-20s for the Knights about a decade ago.

Fulton was in Newcastle working for radio 2GB when he was distracted from the gibber by this brilliant young Fijian.

“He scored five tries in a game,” Fulton said. “I turned to (Ray) Hadley and said, ‘Jesus, have a look at this bloke’.”

As a selector, Fulton went on to play a part in Uate’s representative rise. Then came Uate’s fall, though it was not necessarily all the fault of Newcastle.

Some will tell you it was the fact Uate was being paid too much money and got lazy. Others suggest he wasn’t getting the right love in the wrong environment. Either way, Fulton knew it wasn’t Uate’s ability letting him down.

So when Fulton’s son Scott, who looks after Manly’s junior recruitment, told his dad Uate was on the market, the old man spotted a bargain.

It’s just one of the many smart deals he has done since he returned to Manly, a club that wasn’t too far ahead of the Knights at the start of last year.

You look through Manly’s squad and, aside from a couple of big names, it’s mostly made up of unwanteds and previously unknowns.

Like Uate. Like Brian Kelly, who came from the Titans’ under-20s.

Curtis Sironen was another, unwanted at Wests Tigers. Lloyd Perrett was lost in the system at Canterbury.

Addin Fonua-Blake, a wild child who needed direction, is now one of the form middle forwards in the comp at 21.

Frank Winterstein was Frank Who?

You could go on and on.

Sure, Manly paid big money to get Daly Cherry-Evans to backflip on the Gold Coast.

But even then most thought they kept the wrong playmaker after letting Kieran Foran go.

Then there was Dylan Walker’s signing after his troubles at Souths.

Martin Taupau was a talent but still a gamble.

The emergence of local juniors, Jake and Tom Trbojevic, helped big time. But in fairness, Fulton made sure Manly didn’t lose them.

Piece by piece he put this NRL jigsaw together.

Even when Fulton went after the untried Trent Barrett to replace Geoff Toovey as coach it was seen as a huge mistake.

“He was always going to be something,” Fulton said.

“He has a way about him. Great personality, great people skills and, above all, he is a great student of the game.”

Fulton copped plenty for most of his decisions, but look at Manly now.

“We backed our judgment,” he said.

And it’s a lesson for a lot of clubs, not just Newcastle, on how to go about an NRL rebuild. Proof bargains still exist under the salary cap, if you have the nous to spot them.

 

[Highflier]

Also in most instances where a new coaching team comes in, there are players tapped on the shoulder and others who are recruited. Seibs has recruited Woods, Simpkin, Paulo, Lodge, TKO, Brooks, Brown, Chee Kam, Willett, Jazz, Schoupp, James, Matterson, Talau, etc.

He released The Fainus x 3, Schuster, Keppie, Lawton, Tuilagi, Tuipolotu, Weekes, etc

on the basis of that list and of ticks for good recruits or releasing the right players and Xs for recruiting duds or releasing the wrong player he has in my maroon and white eyes a net positive differential of 2.5 ,between good decisions and bad .Very simplistic way of looking at it .
Anyways Go Manly

 

[Brookie1973]

I think it's just out of frustration and hope. We don't see much hope in the team or our current recruitment "strategy", so we have to find it somewhere.

Also, speaking personally, I really dislike Scott Penn's face.

I share the frustrations, and the dislike of Scott Penn’s face.

 

[CoreyWaddellSuperFan]

I'd take either at this stage, it's just unfortunate we are always pinning our hopes on untested candidates. Wish we had a plan to identify a high performing assistant at a successful club and give them a shot in a calculated way rather than (1) eh, he's already here, give him a shot, or (2) he used to play for Manly, he'll do.

Here's an idea from left field ...

Let's target Bellyache Jnr!

 

[Lloyd]

Based on what has already been said by the club, I’d say the most likely scenario is for an offseason announcement that next year will be Seibolds last one in charge, and that Ennis will take on a full time assistant coaching role in 2026, with a view to taking over in 2027. Seibold to move into some director of coaching/football dept type role. Ideally, the announcement would also include some wider shake ups of the coaching dept, with perhaps someone like Ballin brought in as an assistant, for greater succession options.

The only other avenue they could take would be to blow the place up and start again, but I don’t see much appetite for that.

I think a change in coach would provide a short term boost. New ideas, new voice, more enthusiasm etc. However this forward pack we have isn’t going to become miraculously better in the long run. They unfortunately don’t have the ability. I would take a couple of years of pain to clean the place out. Let’s look abroad, the uk, nz, pacific islands,even South Africa. Get on the front foot before the Bears go down that line. It only takes a couple of good young players to make a large difference.

 

[Cliffycomeback]

I think a change in coach would provide a short term boost. New ideas, new voice, more enthusiasm etc. However this forward pack we have isn’t going to become miraculously better in the long run. They unfortunately don’t have the ability. I would take a couple of years of pain to clean the place out. Let’s look abroad, the uk, nz, pacific islands,even South Africa. Get on the front foot before the Bears go down that line. It only takes a couple of good young players to make a large difference.

Surely we have already begun talking to several candidates for next year with Sipley, Aloiai, James and possibly Lodge gone. Whoever comes in will be all over our lack of depth in the backrow. Hart looks the goods but we will need at least one more established player to go with what we already have.

 

[Phobia]

If the Ennis news is true, I'll need a volunteer for the pagan ritual sacrifice I plan to perform on the hill. Don't worry, you won't be the human sacrifice! All you need to do, is just bash me on the head with the 2011 trophy repeatedly, until I believe that Ennis will bring us a premiership.

Not even a lobotomy would be enough to make me physically believe this, so you'll simply have to bash me to death! Brilliant. Whisper "results driven business" in my ear when I'm going. Then, simply dedicate me to a deity of your choosing, Jesus, Vishnu, Barrett, I don't care.

I can guarantee that this will bring us a premiership. We do have a premiership winning roster, after all.

Alternatively, tell March 2022 me that in 2025, our coaching choices are either Seibold or Ennis, and I'll just do all of the above myself.