Here is a question from our board that most on here should be able to answer;

When TS joined you in 2004 would you say that he recruited a team in, or did he mainly draw on the existing talent and juniors coming through in order to win the silverware ? Obviously he did bring some players into the squad and I remember he was interested in others e.g. Ellis at the the time, but where would you say was the balance ?

From memory, the new recruits for Smith's first season in 2004 were Marcus Bai, Ali Lauitiiti and Chris McKenna.

Think Carl Ablett and Nick Scruton might have made their first team debuts that year as well?

Gareth Ellis then came in 2005, so it's a bit of both really

McKenna played in 2003. Bai was announced before Smith came in. Apart from that you're spot on. THe team was there, it just got adjusted as time went by

Scruton made his debut before Smith came. Away at Wigan I think. Not sure Ablett made his debut in 2004 though.

As for Smith he worked with what he had, which to be honest any decent coach could have taken to the title in 2004. But then he added and improved which took us to further levels.

It's always difficult to say with Leeds as Hetherington has such a big role in the recruitment of players alongside the head coach.
IIRC under Smith we recruited:
Lauitiiti
Ellis
Donald
Kirke
McAvoy
Millard
O'Neill
Peacock
Thackray
Toopi
Webb

And the likes of Ablett, JJB, Smith, Tansey & Scruton came through.

IMO the difference between the 2003 side, and the 2004 was massive despite it being pretty much the same side. More clinical in attack, and tighter in defence. Whether, this was just a result of good timing as the young players in the team matured I'm not sure, but for the first couple of years of reign we were a superb side and a joy to watch.
It went downhill for the next 18 months as we lost a number of players, and the likes of Calderwood, Mathers, McKenna, Furner, Adamson, Dunemann, Ward, Thackray, Bai, Walker, McDermott all left the club by the end of 2006, and Matt Diskin never quite managed to reproduce his 2004 form so we struggled. Smith deserves real credit for rebuilding the side during that time.

Regarding Warrington, he's been superb for them as well, but he's definitely been there a couple of seasons too long IMO.

Make your own mind up......

=#0000FFBEFORE SMITH
=#FF0000DURING SMITH
=#00BF00AFTER SMITH

[uFull Backs[/u

=#FF0000Brent Webb v Salford 11.02.07
=#0000FFGary Connolly v Castleford 26.12.01
=#FF0000Jordan Tansey v Catalan Dragons 15.09.06
=#FF0000Lee Smith v Wakefield 28.03.05
=#0000FFRichie Mathers v St Helens 00.00.03

[uWingers[/u

=#00BF00Ben Jones Bishop v Celtic Crusaders 18.04.08
=#0000FFFrancis Cummins v Hull KR 19.09.93
=#FF0000Marcus Bai v London 22.02.04
=#0000FFMark Calderwood v ??? 00.00.01
=#FF0000Ryan Hall v Bradford 06.05.07
=#FF0000Scott Donald v Huddersfield 11.02.06

[uCentres[/u

=#00BF00Brett Delaney v Crusaders RL 29.01.10
=#0000FFChev Walker v Halifax 13.08.99
=#FF0000Clinton Toopi v Hull FC 04.08.06
=#00BF00Kallum Watkins v Celtic Crusaders 18.04.08
=#0000FFKeith Senior v London Broncos 10.09.99

[uHalves[/u

=#0000FFDanny McGuire v Salford 06.07.01
=#0000FFKevin Sinfield MBE v Sheffield Eagles 22.08.97
=#0000FFRob Burrow v Hull 06.04.01

[uProp Forwards[/u

=#0000FFBarrie McDermott v Bradford 22.09.95
=#0000FFChris Feather v ??? 00.00.03
=#0000FFDavid Furner v Castleford 26.12.02
=#0000FFDanny Ward v Sheffield Eagles 02.07.99
=#FF0000Ian Kirke v Castleford 05.03.06
=#FF0000Jamie Peacock MBE v Huddersfield 12.02.06
=#FF0000Jamie Thackray v Hull FC 04.08.06
=#FF0000Kylie Leuluai v Salford 11.02.07
=#00BF00Luke Burgess v Castleford 07.03.08
=#FF0000Mark O'Neill v Wakefield 26.12.05
=#0000FFNick Scruton v ??? 00.00.02
=#0000FFRyan Bailey v Wakefield 28.06.02

[uHookers[/u

=#0000FFAndrew Dunemann v ??? 00.00.03
=#00BF00Danny Buderus v Wakefield Wildcats 13.02.09
=#0000FFMatt Diskin v Castleford 24.02.01
=#FF0000Shane Millard v Huddersfield 10.02.06

[uSecond Rowers[/u

=#FF0000Ali Lauitiiti v Salford 28.05.04
=#FF0000Carl Ablett v London Broncos 18.07.04
=#FF0000Gareth Ellis v Castleford 26.12.04
=#0000FFJamie Jones-Buchanan v Wakefield 07.05.99
=#0000FFMatt Adamson v Castleford 26.12.01
=#0000FFWillie Poching v Castleford 26.12.02

Essentially,Smith took a squad which already had the main ingridients to be a success and turned it into winners.There was never a need for major overhaul when he was here,just a sprinkling of quality which most players were who came during his tenure.Similar to what he did at Warrington with the string of CC's and top league finishes.I am a little surprised he hasn't been able to achieve the SL title yet with Wire in that time but he's got damn close just not had the little bit of luck to get the job done.

Thanks for the in depth analysis, appreciated.

For my money still the best coach in the league by some distance.

Whilst I can see your point, I think that he has underperformed at Warrington where he had the opportunity to put them at the top of the RL tree. Despite beating Leeds tice this season and being the only team that leeds have not looked like matching, they are still 7 pointe behind having only won 5 of their other 12 games.

My personal opinion is that he has gone as far as he can go with Warrington and both he and they need a fresh impetus

That's a very good point and one I agree with. If any year was to be Warrington's, it was 2011 in my opinion until you lot turned them over in the final play-off round. You may have won the overall comp, and played the play-offs brilliant, but they were the best team in the league that year.

If you don't think Smith is the best coach in the league, then who is?

My bias may come into it, but I think Wane has to be up there. Turned some average players into one's looking way above their 'perceived' level. I also like McDermott, and his record speaks for itself, but a few of you aren't so keen?

At present there is no team that is performing well. Last season I would have put Powell in the mix, at the moment I don't know, all have their positives but I think all could be questioned on their coaching skills. Wane seems to be a shouter /bully which can have positive effects in the short term but can be detrimental in the long term and I think Wigan are on the edge of that cycle.

Cunningham is looking ok, but a bit raw and Saints results have shown this. I wouldn't put any coach a being better at the moment, the question is more of which coaches have peaked and are now on a downward spiral and which ones can reinvent themselves to produce momentum.

Comparing Smith's Leeds spell with his Warrington spell is tricky with regards to the team that was built during his time.

Hetherington will have played a significant part in the recruitment and we probably would've signed most of the players we did regardless of who was the coach. At Wire I believe he has pretty much full say on who joins and Simon Moran simply deals with the cheque book side of things.

I would say If you tried forming a combined team of academy graduates who played a significant amount of games and became REGULARS during HIS TIME there then it wouldn't make that impressive a reading and he's had 10 years combined at two very big clubs.

If you made a combined team of signings made during his time there then it would look very impressive but how much is that down to Hetherington's infulence at Leeds and Moran's chequebook at Warrington?

What will be interesting to see at Warrington is how they cope now with the immediate departure of Higham to Leigh. During his time at Warrington, their strength over over top teams has consistently been having two top hookers. Higham and Monaghan, and now Clark with the former until his departure this week. Clark no doubt obviously a great player but hasn't quite hit the notes there and if he was to get injured then they're really screwed and it impacts the performance of some other key players for them like Hill and Westwood by the lost at hooker they've experienced.

Smith is massive on the technical side for sure but where he really turned Leeds around was on the psychological side - Leeds was a losing club with a losing mentality and he made them winners. That is the difference between a good coach and a great one.

Instead of thinking about theoretical combined teams of this and that make a list of the trophies he has won.

There's a lot on that list.

An excellent coach.

Reality is though, 6 seasons in charge at Warrington and no GF win to show for the teams they assembled is a disappointing return no matter how you look at it. If it wasn't Smith at Warrington and another coach so their was no emotional connection to his time at Leeds would you say no GF win was acceptable.....I doubt it.

At Leeds, yes the first year and a half were excellent at a time both Saints and Wigan had issues. Once Saints got their act together we fell massively behind them but managed to do them on one night in his last game.

Yes he's won trophies but he had teams that could do that, but those teams also lost a fair few, make a list of those....

Leeds

CCF - 2005
GF - 2005
CCsf - 2006 against a inexperienced in big games Hudds
Playoffs 2006 - similar vs Wire

Warrington

playoffs - 2011
Gf - 2012
Gf - 2013
CCsf - 2013 against an average Hull side
CCsf - 2014 against leeds could barely complete a set in the first half.

Considering that Wire's CC runs weren't the most toughest along the way then some context should be taken there. They beat Leeds twice in the final, but hell even Hull beat us in a final and we had to carefully tip-toe past Castleford to win it. Their other win against big game failure Huddersfield.

For the teams he had under his control he hasn't won as much as he should have done by a long chalk.

To go from LLS in 2011 with scoring over a thousand points to a very average W/L record in 2015 and a real fight to make the top 4 on their hands.....that's real backwards progress and one that wouldn't be tolerated by people on this board if it happened at Leeds.

Also it should be pointed out that the point of the thread was about Smith's teams in terms of recruitment/juniors under him because obviously a Wire fan is wondering how they'll move forward forward in terms of squad building.

Not whether he is a good coach so completely missing the point.

Yes, the poster focusing on how many trophies a coach wins is "missing the point".

How many GF wins did they have before Smith? How many CC wins?

If failing to win a GF is unacceptable then almost every coach every year is unacceptable.

I think the point he is making is a big club, i.e. Leeds, Wigan, Saints, Warrington. Look at the money Warrington have spent since Smith went there. Is a big club not winning a GF in 6 years acceptable? So not really a case of almost every coach.

My opinion of Smith at Wire is that he could have done better.

He has taken a team that was spending close to full cap and struggling to one which is competing for and winning trophies, though the pots seem to have dried up a bit recently.

Since 2010 (when Leeds gave up their stranglhold on the SL title) the sequence has been

WIG
LEE
LEE
WIG
STH

The SL title has been shared around the big teams, with no-one being dominant. However, Wire have always fallen short in the play-offs.

A former poster may describe them as flattrack bullies, who play open expansive rugby when there is little pressure or opposition is weak, but when the level gets upped, they can't quite find that extra 1% needed to win the GF.

That culture I feel is down to the coach, and is something we did show ourselves in the time he was in charge.

And yet Warrington have found themselves very capable of winning big games in the Challenge Cup under Smith.

Yes he is if he reads the opening post and sees what is actually being asked.....it isn't whether or not Smith is a good coach or how many trophies he's won btw.

No they aren't because different teams have different expectations. Reality is during Smith's years at Wire there has been only really 4 teams realistically good enough to win the GF (Wire, Leeds, Saints, Wigan)......only one of those teams haven't won it during his spell in charge.

And no Warrington didn't reach any SL GF's before he came, but how many of those seasons did they have a team thought of as good enough to reach Old Trafford?