Quote: Smack him Jimmy "So we're bottom of our league and playing poop.
Fev have just sacked Jon Sharp, despite seeming on paper (and Fevgrinder will correct me if i'm wrong) him getting them two very good years in the Championship; consecutive finishing in top four, got to Challenge cup quarter finals, and currently sat 3rd in table.
John Duffy has given his notice in at Swinton (probably going to Fev)
Matt Diskin has turned Dewsbury round - from floundering just above us and not able to beat anyone, now they're 8th in the table and have won more games than Rochdale, Oldham, Swinton and us.
Then you look at Wakei who were in that unforgettable (for the wrong reasons) Million pound game against us - at the time they were struggling but (and no disrespect to Wakei) they were pretty similar standard to us.
Now they're in the top four of Super league, and playing some very good rugby.
So I'm thinking - how come other teams who were struggling and playing pretty poop like us - can improve so much and yet we just keep getting worse. I'm not asking why we are cr@p, we could write 50 pages on that. I'm just wondering what makes similar teams play so much better and actually win games - is it the player, the coach or both - and if the latter, why arent we getting any better?'"
SHJ,
Personally I am really surprised with JS getting the sack and even more so at the timing of it. His record at Fev over the period doesn't look bad: 2015 - 5th, 2016 - 4th, 2017 - 3rd?, winning the Shield in 2015, quarter finals of the CC this year. It had crossed my mind that if Fev made 3rd this year, won a couple of games in the middle 8's and Bradford got relegated, to come back on here and ask if everyone thought Toovey is a better coach than JS. Though the truth is that given the players available to both coaches I realise that this would not have been a fair question.
For me it looks to be more going on behind the scenes than meets the eye. I guess I will never know.
However back to the question, I personally think that it is a combination of the two. You have to have a coach that can communicate and explain what he wants the players to do. And then you have to have players that can take on board what has been requested and execute it. Some players don't have the ability to undertake what is being asked of them and some coaches do not have the ability to communicate what they want. Don't forget not everyone learns in the same way and sometime you have to adapt your communication skills to get things over.
I would go with it being 60% Players and 40% Coaching that wins games and the 20% difference is that the players have to be good enough to adapt on the pitch to current circumstances, which are sometime out side of the control of them or the coach.
