TBH i think Wane and Anderson part time would be a great combo, big, scary, intellegent, passionate coaches.

Mac has done a great job in creating a team spirit and not overworking the players, although it seems some took advantage of this, i think his only problem was team selection.

I don't really follow your logic here. You're in favour of getting rid of MacNamara. That's fine; it's not a point of view I share but it's sensible if you see better options out there. But at least MacNamara got his side playing to within a few percentage points of their capabilities in the most important game of his tenure. Yet you see Anderson as a credible replacement when patently his side fell away at the most critical point of his first season in charge. I'm not having a dig at Anderson here; I'm sure he's smart enough to learn from it and become a better coach in the process. But there's simply no evidence that he's as far along that learning curve as MacNamara is.

McNamara should stay in the job unless we have a structure and/or personnel who would be better than him.

What McNamara has done and done well is build a squad, put in place the support structures around them, get them together regularly, and build towards this.

People proposing we just have a club coach who does the job part time need to see what a step backwards that is. We can’t just have a club coach who turns up at the end of the year to try and get results.

Part of me sees McNamara has done a very good job, part of me also thinks that letting him go would send out a message that failure is no longer tolerated. A galvanising effect that sends a message that we aren’t accepting being the plucky losers anymore.

For that we need to have something better in place. What that something is, is the question.

Im not sure that there are any coaches better than McNamara out there who would do the job full-time, which would mean a change of structure, possibly someone like Ellery Hanley taking control of the performance aspect full-time, with McDermott, Wane maybe even someone like Sculthorpe assisting with the first team squad.

Reports in League Express that he could become the backs coach at Bath RU

Regardless of how people think McNamara has performed, I think it's time for a change. McNamara could stay on in some capacity, perhaps as a liaison with the NRL-based players during the season, with the actual coaching job going back to part-time.

A few good things have been implemented, the regular squad meetings at Loughborough and the Knights for example. I think the squad needs to be freshened up now and get ready to build towards the future and ultimately the next WC. Players like Sinfield, Westwood, O'Loughlin, Burrow are getting on now and we've got to start looking at replacing them.

I'd put together an ETS and a Knights squad with this in mind. Something like:

England ETS:
FB: Sam Tomkins, Jonny Lomax
W: Ryan Hall, Josh Charnley, Tom Briscoe
C: Kallum Watkins, Leroy Cudjoe, Jack Reed
HB: Gareth Widdop, Matty Smith, Richie Myler
Utility: Zak Hardaker, Stefan Ratchford
P: James Graham, George Burgess, Chris Hill, Lee Mossop, Tom Burgess, Scott Taylor, LMS
H: James Roby, Mike McIlorum, Shaun Lunt
SR: Brett Ferres, Liam Farrell, Danny Kirmond, Carl Ablett
LF: Sam Burgess

Knights:
FB: Greg Eden, Jamie Shaul, Matty Russell
W: Jermaine McGilvary, Tom Lineham, Jodie Broughton
C: Ben Crooks, Iain Thornley, Josh Jones
HB: Gareth O'Brian, Sam Powell, Liam Sutcliffe
Utility: Dan Sarginson, Tom Makinson
P: Alex Walmsley, Dom Crosby, Liam Watts, Brad Singleton
H: Danny Houghton, Darryl Clark, Josh Hodgson
SR: Ben Currie, Chris Clarkson, Jack Hughes
LF: John Bateman, Stevie Ward

Sure I've missed loads out and there will be lads who are 18-21 now who will be pushing for places in a few years time. But there is plenty of talent and potential without having to rely on the players who won't be around in 4 years time. The first team need more games against NZ and Australia and the Knights need regular fixtures against the other European sides, or Pacific Island teams.

Other than wishful thinking I've never heard any suggestion that Hanley is likely to ever return to the game in any serious capacity.
Even if he did, I'm not sure what he could offer. He's been out of it for at least 12 years and his coaching reputation always seemed to be more based on his previous playing ability than anything else.

If and when there is a change, we need Shaun Edwards as coach with a strong manager in addition for tournaments eg Hetherington

Smokey,

There was a moment on Saturday when Tanya Arnold asked McNamara if he thought it had been a good world cup despite the issues at the start. A good and honest man, such as Stephen Kearney, would have shrugged his shoulders, looked a little bit conciliatory and would have said, "yeah, we had issues but we worked through them, learned from them and it made us stronger."

That would have been a class answer and respect would have gone to the coach. Instead McNamara quickly turns indignant and says, " we had no problems, this is a strong squad" or words to that effect. Talk about rewriting history. I thought at that moment the idiot has learnt nothing.

That wasn't the fault of the RL press that was McNamara not having the basic understanding that sometimes it is okay to show weakness or errors or to admit to mistakes. If he can't learn that basic approach do you think he will get any media support?

That’s just nonsense.

You have simply invented something someone else would have said, to criticise a McNamara quote you don’t really remember.

I don’t think any England manager needs media support.

The RL media are uniformly terrible, each running their personal little campaigns, and bitching and whining when stories aren’t handed to them on a plate. The national media don’t give us much but what they do isn’t anywhere near the depth to be troubling.

I'd agree but this isn't a proposal being put forward solely by posters on this board. Several media sources over the weekend have stated quite unequivocally that this decision has already been made by the powers that be.

Nope, I recall something like that in the on pitch interview straight after the game, and thought that McNamara should improve his media skills too.

Smokey,

It isn't nonsense. I have watched Kearney and how he responds to tricky interview questions and it is always the same, he doesn't go defensive and if there is something to own up about he does in quite a passive manner. Now compare that to the behaviour of McNamara (and whilst I didn't get the words exact his were far more rude).

Media support helps, you shouldn't go out to avoid it, whatever you think.

Why are all the RL media terrible? What campaigns have the BBC had from its journalists? The coverage and positivity has been very good but we shouldn't take the route of treating McNamara like he's Sir Alex Ferguson and asking only compliant questions and he, McNamara, shouldn't take the approach that he should only be asked questions he likes.

Compare his reactions after the French game (nice questions) to after the NZ game (mostly nice questions and then a chance to show that mistakes had been made with him coming out of it with a stronger rep for being conciliatory)

He could have handled it a lot more professionally but also shown human traits other than defensive behaviour and indignation.

I also thought McNamara's response to the question after Saturday's game showed a man who didn't have the composure to deal with the media very well. Again, though, I think that's when you wheel out your urbane, less-pressured team manager, rather than your hyped-up, upset coach. Phil Clarke would be perfect for that sort of role, for example.

Coming back to the position of whether the post is full or part-time, I think that I want to make it clear that I do not believe it would be a step back. We need to look at the roles required for the national game, and step away from coinsidering that they all have to be performed by one man.

Yes there needs to be a development pathway, and yes, training camps and get togethers need to be organised. But that is an admin job, not a coaching job. The only input the coach needs into such things is to name the players to be invited, and then work with them at and around the training camps. The bulk of the work there is in organisation and logistics, and that's a manager job, not a coach job. David Waite first took on the role of developing that structure, but it was clear that he saw that as his full-time talent-development role, as opposed to his role as coach of the national side, which is different.

The coach's job is picking the squad, which can easily be done from a part-time perspective. There's no actual reason why we couldn't use a selection panel of assistants and coaches from other clubs to help advise the national coach. There's only so many rugby league teams from which players can be selected, and our club coaches see an awful lot of their opponents' games in the course of their day jobs.

In terms of the actual coaching, that is very part-time, centred immediately before and during tournaments and matches. Events like the World Cup and 4 nations take place after the SL season, and so a club coach could be released for duty without too much difficulty.

I'm open-minded about this, and if someone like Sean Edwards or Wayne Bennet was willing to do it, but only full-time, then I'd say fine, full-time it is. But I see nothing which demands a full-time coach, as opposed to a full-time manager, with the best coach possible - part-time if necessary.

If you want examples of how the RL media are terrible, well take Chris Irvine for example, who can barely get through a paragraph without nursing a hard-on for Danny Brough, The BBC? Try taking a look at George Riley’s potical ‘investigation’ in to the financial state of the game. That was embarrassing not because of the wild, contextless and incorrect claims Riley made, but because it was poorly produced, poorly researched e that would fail a media-studies A level.

If Tanya Arnold wants to carry on pushing the same story she has been pushing for weeks, yet has failed to get enough proof to run, Im not sure why she should expect Steve McNamara to make her job easier for her.

The coaches job isn’t just picking the side any more though.

It is the weekly meetings with performance analysts, it is not only the organising the get togethers but deciding who to invite and what you are going to do there. It is deciding the game plan and working with the players to implement it.

This is something which happens every day, not every 9 months.

There isn’t one major sport which has a part-time national coach for a reason.