Whilst it is a sad day when a club with as much prestige as Saints is firing their coach 7 games into the season, it was however needed as every team we have played this season have been able to predict how we will attack and our playmakers have been closed down quickly. Our plays were slow and no back up plans to the game plan Royce employs.

I wish Royce every success in his future endeavours and thank him for the further development of our potential young stars of the future.

Good to see Eamon making this decision. I've been very critical of the club on here and was one of the many who called for this action to be taken.

It shows they are conscious of the importance of the club challenging for trophies and how much it will impact the club commercially if we are not. The next choice of coach is a massive decision and they need to get it right.

Getting rid of Royce is one thing, but to then employ a vastly inexperienced coaching team to take over from him, and expect them to guide the Saints club through it's most difficult period in quite some time, is laughable.

Why is it a ridiculous knee jerk? It's obviously not working and what benefit would seeing the season out have had?

You don't know what was going on behind the scenes. People who do on here have spoken in recent weeks about the players and the coach not agreeing on how things are done tactically. In that situation it's up to the coach to get everyone on board and playing his way. He clearly failed to do that. I thought the scenes on Sky from the Bradford game were telling. Saints went out onto the field early after a talk by Purtill, leaving Royce walking round in a circle in the changing rooms. Purtill was also apparently taking the team talks because of issues with Simmons and the players. It doesn't take much to read into it that he didn't have everyone's support within the club. In those kind of situations, it is always the coach that loses out, it's happened before and it'll happen again.

Had we kept Royce we WOULD have lost the next 3 games at least. Being in the bottom 2 or 3 after 10 games would not have been acceptable for Saints.

Depends on how you look at it. We would have lost the next 3 games under Simmons. So sacking them now gives at least a possibility that there will be a positive reaction from the players and an up turn in form. If not, we can just blame it on Simmons and the mess he's created.

I'm surprised that Eammon has made this decision; as I've posted elsewhere, I expected to see Royce see out his contract or go voluntarily if the situation got any worse.

If the chairman is prepared to take the financial hit of paying off two high profile staff members, then I think it's the right move. It's sad for Royce who I think has given his best, but I think a good clean sweep will help put the club on a positive footing again.

They'll be a positive reaction I'm sure, whether it'll be enough to get the win remains to be seen. It's when euphoria about the new coaching team dies down, and your perhaps still not performing to Saints " standards", then we'll see what this coaching team has about them. It's times like these that experienced heads are needed, any Wigan fan will tell you that.



That's the spirit. I'm sure by thinking like that you'll challenging for honors in no time.

As usual, you are talking utter garbage.

How can you describe it as being ridiculous and knee-jerk when we are playing some of the worst rugby in the 20 years I've been watching Saints?
His tactical knowledge/awareness is shocking and our team looks absolutely clueless.
Only an idiot would fail to see that a change simply had to happen and unfortunately he is just not up to the job.

And if we were the "old boys club" that you claim we are, a certain Mr.Long wouldn't be running up and down the Salford touchline nowadays.

Your post is as clueless as Royce's team selections.

You'll still lose the next 3 games

Spooge. I have to agree with Saddened for once. Bringing KC in will generate some good will allowing the team much needed time to recover form. Hold the same coach will build pressure on the players, now it's done, the current coaching team will not get hammered by the fans even if we get hammered by Leeds, Warrington and Wigan.

Royce has been sacked so now anything bad is obviously going to get lumped on him. If the result on Sunday goes bad, we can hardly say well that proves the sacking was a bad call.

This will give us 3 weeks to in a way reshape for the next part of the season after easter. To work on some plays and basically pick a team that can bring some wins.

I'll hold you to that!

I saw just as bad last season so what you say is to your usual levels of nothingness.


Such an intelligent response. I am entirely overwhelmed and therefore unable to reply.