hi ya,

I am a first time poster, long time reader to the cherry and white forum.

I live in Australia. Locally I'm a big Rooster fan (crap year, don't mention it) who wishes that we got Madge rather than Brian Smith.

But you got him, and we didn't, so i thought i'd give you a Sydney understanding of why Maguire is so highly considered and why i'm gutted.

Firstly he is a coach for whom every player wants to play for.
Secondly, he is fitness and discipline focused.
Thirdly his style is to build pressure and to "pull the trigger" only when necessary. this style doesn't need flashy halves or any particular position to be overplayed. the toilers can contribute as well as the special talents. as a fan i like this becuase at Easts we have a board that keeps trying to buy success with lots of poor recruitment choices to fill in the gaps created by poor coaching styles.
Fourthly, his columns in Big League have been a revelation for us fans. he writes about difficult topics such as bench use and defense patterns really simply.
reason Five, he seems to be an easy going bloke on TV which is a change from grumpy paternal figures like Brian Smith.
Reason 6, Maguire, Bellamy and Kearney have pushed the idea that coaching is a total organisation job. everything starts and ends with the coaching staff - front office, recruitment, fitness, community relations, fans involvement, specialist skills, eduication and welfare - they are all the domain of the head coach. a club wins a championship, a team only wins a game. thats the sort of motto we want at Easts (but aren't now going to get).
and finally becuase he has a reputation quite simply of being the cleverest bloke in Australia for tactics. at the Storm he was the attacking coach (not the backs coach as others have written). the Storm playbook is his invention, Bellamy confirmed that a few weeks ago on a radio interview. did you see the semi final of Storm versus Broncos? there was about 3 backline moves that had any league fan cheering. just clever stuff.

so, does any of this guarantee success - nup. Nothing guarantees success, but what we Easts fans want is a guy to shape the young lives and the old club into a coherent unified high performance culture. and thats what you'll get with MM. and its what i don't thijnk we'll now get at Easts with Bwian.

The Storm are a ridiculous young club. barely 12 years old. Yet their players play for each other and their jersey more than my club which is 102 years old. Thats the Bennett Way. Thats the Bellamy way. And now thats the Maguire way. and now, i dare say, that'll be the Wigan way.

Brian Smith assistants are the biggest faction of coaches out there.

Wayne Bennett assistants are the highest quality faction of coaches out there. Bellamy, Henjak, Maguire, Kearney.

Good luck to the C&W's next year. I'll be cheering from Sydney for youse all.

Are you mystic meg, its practically 12 months to the day. I got ever so confused reading page 19. Then realised its actually 2010 not 2009.

But my god everything Norweb said is practically true.

I got a tad confused too, then realised there must be a very good reason for resurrecting this thread. Perhaps it was to give end of season awards to mini rouge and flying kelvin?

It's not always great saying I told you so

Fair play, you could see something some of our own fans couldn't.

and that he did....what an incredible year! It was clear to see from the off that Maguire was the right man for the job. I just hope we can keep him for as long as possible.