He gets this level of criticism because lots of people think that Smith is far less hands on in the the day to day coaching of the team, and that vast amounts of things in training are done by Agar.

I don't know if that's true or not, but if it is then he rightly deserves the level of scrutiny and criticism he gets.

What was the difference between Warrington in 2009-10 under Tony Smith or 2008-09 under James Lowes?

Richie Mathers?

Great signing RM.
another we dumped on.

Hardly dumped on - we signed Brett Hodgson and he was only ever going to be a back up after that (Hodgson didn't get injured much either), so it made sense to let him go to somewhere where he would be a starter.

We also gave him a job at the club after he retired as a player.

I think it was as much about who left as part of that deal - a certain Mr Gleeson. If what I've heard was true there was something of a drinking culture at that time and Cullen was seen as being too pally with the players.

I thought we kept Cullen too long as coach, but I find the idea that he was a soft touch that would allow players to take the mickey out of the p&b unlikely.