and how

Pot, kettle, and how are the gates in Wrexham old chap?

We are in 11th.

Last year we finished 13th.

People were asking for the coach's head weeks ago when we were higher.

When we have less than a full compliment, we struggle. Our squad clearly does not have the depth. Yet people say youngsters should be playing. Then when we lose. The coach is crap.

I don't get it. I really don't.

Give the coach a chance. He showed early on in the piece he can deliver something. Give him time and preferably a better squad.

It's not always the coach.

The problem is more squad depth than a poor coach.

Judging by the half-time score at Leigh tonight, appointing Nobby as a consultant has worked instant wonders for Halifax. Something likewise for us could have a similar effect. McRae or Tony Rea or ...?

Ellery Hanley if it is a mental thing, the guy might not have been the most technical of coaches but he really does exude confidence and rugby league hasn't changed that much over recent seasons to say that he wouldn't be useful as a football guru to just put a bit of positivity around the place.

Ellery, yes please!

4 players for Hull playing a second game in a few days and we still don't appear to be on the same playing field as the opposition. Does everyone believe that this team is a team that should be letting in this many points every week and losing by a heavy margin every week. I was not at the game but await the same old pattern of tries being run in along the same old channels that they seem to be scored in, and virtually unopposed.

The team is the one that it losing the games, and to quote Daniel Defoe "it is better to have a lion at the head of an army of sheep, than a sheep at the head of an army of lions."

news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 018837.stm Terry Matterson leaving Cas, expected to move to an NRL club for an assistants role at best, but is their any worth in us having a word with someone who has a strong affinity for London, the London club, rugby league in London and the European Super League. A head-coaches position at a heavily invested SL club in London would surely be an attractive proposition to a former London Broncos captain and may allow him to go back to Australia in a few years and get a better position within an NRL club. It would also allow Rob Powell time to complete his apprenticeship rather than on the job training.

news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 018837.stm Terry Matterson leaving Cas, expected to move to an NRL club for an assistants role at best, but is their any worth in us having a word with someone who has a strong affinity for London, the London club, rugby league in London and the European Super League. A head-coaches position at a heavily invested SL club in London would surely be an attractive proposition to a former London Broncos captain and may allow him to go back to Australia in a few years and get a better position within an NRL club. It would also allow Rob Powell time to complete his apprenticeship rather than on the job training.

Wasn't it only recently they were calling for his head in Cas

If we want an Aussie lets bring one in with recent experience of the Aus game like MGuire, Brown etc. At least introduce boring defensive tactics

Wouldn't say no to going down the NRL route, only problem being that we as the non-elite SL clubs cannot entice the NRL coaches. Salford appointed a guy I had never heard of and I'm pretty clued up on all matters Antipodean, and I'd be suprised if we could get a name that anyone knows, even if we are serious about spending to cap. The only name I know that could come to us would be our former asst coach Rohan Smith, son of Brian Smith, as Matt Elliott is to become the Roosters asst coach from 2012. Rohan Smith has coached the Tongan national side, but would another young coach be the answer, or help Rob Powells development I don't know.

We are in a better position to look for a coach in 2012 if there is money to spend for players.

If you were clued up would you not know the names of the Origin asst coaches

Had you heard of MaGuire before he moved to the Pies- he was No 3 at The Storm behind Bellamy and Kearney.

With the best will in the world, talking about a new coach is a red herring. It only applies if you think there are coaches out there who could conjure more wins out of the squad Quins have. Ultimately, you can only get so much out of a certain set of players. Maguire did very well at Wigan because he took a squad which was underperforming and made them play at their max. Potter did ok at Saints with a squad in transition,and a lot of people thought that when he went to Bradford, he'd significantly improve them after MacNamara, but results this year show that maybe mediocrity is all the Bradford squad were ever capable of. Tony Smith's got a good record, but the improvement at Warrington also tracks a huge investment in new players. I can't think of any instance in which a coach has seen playing quality decline (as has happened at Harlequins in the last 5 years), but results improve.

If you think, genuinely, that the Quins 17 taking the field could, given a different coach, regularly beat most other SL sides, then I understand why you might call for a new coach. Personally, I think the only sides they can realistically compete with are Salford, Wakefield and Crusaders. Anything else is a bonus. You could get Wayne Bennett in, and that wouldn't change.

Two facts about this year

1) Our squad is very average, also very thin on actual 'first grade' talent.
2) Powell is well in over his head#

I for one am not at all surprised about our league position.

Yeah I did know of McGuire, not as a player though, but yeah I was suprised to have a new name thrown at me, and being on the Origin coaching staff. Talking of Origin asst coaches, why not Michael Hagan, surely a chance to go down to Nathan Brown route and find a deal that benefits both parties, all he has to do is give up 3 games a year and join a club that has said it is going to spend big.

news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 029037.stm Could he help out?

news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 029037.stm Could he help out?

The issue is that DH wanted Darryl Powell but got Rob instead, which I think the vast majoroty of us knew would happen anyway.

Rob has been doing this job with one hand tied behind his back and his feet tied together. It can't have been an easy task this head coaching mullarkey with the financial constraints that he has had to work under.

We need to apppoint an highly experienced (and probably antipodean ) Head Coach for a minimum 3 year period with Rob tacking a a role as Assistant Head Coach with a view to him becoming head coach after the new man's tenure.

Win a couple of more games this season and i think we can agree whilst we would be disappointed after such a great start that we take it as a average Quins RL season.

Well Nigel Wright is based in London for part of the week, but I don't see him as a figure who would greatly improve the coaching staff, he would just be another okay figure and for me it would only add another chef into the mix, without any clear recipes for success in his locker.

www.sportinglife.com/rugbyleague ... ml&BID=480 John Kear worth a shout with Rob Powell as his assistant at the London Super League club?

www.sportinglife.com/rugbyleague ... ml&BID=480 John Kear worth a shout with Rob Powell as his assistant at the London Super League club?

Can David Hughes afford him?

Every available experienced coach is worth a shout. Anyone but Powell.

Or is David Hughes the Arsene Wenger of the rugby league world, refusing to pay big money for transfers, sign established players or break the wage structure at the club. All admirable stances but one that everyone in football can see is noble but wrong in 2011, and if the noises that Gus Mackay has been making, we are moving towards throwing a few pound notes around. With Kear a free agent I say we give him another shot at an expansion club and our first genuine career coach since John Monie, I only discount Tony Rea as the Broncos was his first coaching role.

Kear is a free agent, English and a genuine career coach with bags of experience and at 56 he has a good few years ahead of him.

Sounds like he's already earmarked for Castleford:

[iKear, who guided both Sheffield Eagles and Hull to surprise Challenge Cup final victories, has ambitions to remain in Super League and only recently spoke of his interest in the coaching vacancy looming at neighbouring Castleford, where Australian Terry Matterson is leaving at the end of the season.

Castleford-born Kear played as a winger for the club and was assistant coach when they lifted the Challenge Cup in 1986.

"It's a club I've got connections with and I've spent a lot of my life there so I've obviously got feelings for it," said Kear when asked about the possibility of succeeding Matterson.[/i

Hello Wire Quin,

My view is that to be successful you need to have high quality in the five main ball playing positions (Fullback, Stand Off, Scrum Half, Hooker and Loose Forward) with a selection of Props whom are genuinely difficult to stop and whom seldom miss tackles. You can then surround them with a series of genetically gifted players whom have two of pace, size and power in the backs and players whom will work hard at marker, tackle continually and with the supreme players also having a quality offload.

In my view Warrington has many significant advantages versus a London club. They are the only club whom has continually been in the top-flight throughout its history, have almost 200,000 residents few of whom support e.g. Warrington Wolverines whom are also playing top-flight Rugby and whose colours are the most recognized in club rugby in the world.

The demographic is also good, most of the population have British heritage, rather than Asian heritage which makes it unlikely they would be introduced to the game and in a place with little or no sporting alternative people are sure to know of the only show in town with the stadium likely to be a prominent landmark.

They also have opened a new stadium within the last decade, which is something known to bring in interest from new supporters, think of the first game for Quins RL, Fulham etc.

However, despite all these advantages they were 10th in the early 2000s and 10th again in 2009, when the club had a nice run to the final and unexpectedly won the cup against the odds; this suddenly introduced a host of benefits.

I would simply state that the owner has just lavished cash in the past 24 months. He has brought in the best manager possible for acquisition and development (Tony Smith), the Man of Steel (Hodgson), a first choice Australian outside back sacked for off-field demeanours (J.Monaghan) and lavished several hundred thousand on buying both a scrum-half (Myler) and centre (Atkins). In the forwards he also signed internationals Carvell and Solomona.

There's also been talent come through in the backs, in line with my theories... Blythe, Evans, Williams etc whilst the forwards are mainly out on loan, proving that SL is not the place to throw in youngsters into your first team.

The first cup win has managed to attract support in a province whose support fell to as little as 5,000 for three games in 2002 but the Challenge Cup is not only the most profitable cup to win (as the Grand Final money is split amongst all the SL clubs) but has proved to be a great marketing exercise.

Imagine if your first game was seeing your small unheralded region winning at Wembley? That certainly helped take up crowds from below 10k to over 10k every week.

Having Hodgson, Briers, Myler, M Monaghan and Grix/Solomona with two GB internationals in Morley and Carvell with the under-rated Wood and Cooper is a decent foundation. It won't win Super League. It is not as good as the genuinely great SL teams, such as when you had Saints in their prime with Wellens, Pryce, Long, Cunningham and Sculthorpe whilst Leeds had Webb, McGuire, Burrow, Diskin and Sinfield.

Wigan's crop is S Tomkins, Deacon, Finch, Leuluai, O'Loughlin. Warrington are not far from this but lack the same quality in the forwards.

In terms of Wigan, again this is a team that has been more-or-less continually successful for decades, especially when they spent £3.1 million a season and the opposition was part-time - only when they refused to develop their own players did they become unstuck - whilst Saints have again been successful in modern history, but are now in decline, so not much point making a comparison with a London club.

Cheers
Mark

how long is RPs contract?

Two year contract that ends and the conclusion of the 2012 season. A move back to assistant would need no major alteration to the terms of his contract, if he goes altogether at the clubs choice we would need to pay him a years salary.