Was that the one where we took about 6000 fans and had about 60 odd coaches? I still remember all the Wire fans singing along to Bon Jovi's 'Livin on a Prayer' pre match like it was yesterday.

I’m confused. Are we talking about the WCC Bradford v Newcastle or Wires play off games with Johns following beating Leeds?

The PO game following the Leeds game with Johns was against Hull away.

The Bradford v Wire game was the year before the game after when Briers got the drop goal v Leeds.

ah, well, you see he didn't turn up cos this was a year later, he was here in 2005, this was 2006.



yes, the club were getting as many coaches as they could.



yes and or no



not quite, johns was over in 05, we did the leeds game, then hull away was in the league, then we played hull in the play offs at the hj.

The bradford game i referred to was in the play offs in 2006

40-24 apparently, bulls went out in the next round to hull

From the outside it seems like one of the biggest decisions Warrington will have made in their history. If you get the right man you can become a true force and finally win a few titles. If not, you could end up in another round of rebuilding and disappearing from contention for a while.

Wane is a proven winner, but can he replicate it outside of Wigan? It's a big unknown as his era there was filled with dour anti-rugby tactics that didn't wash even with the Wigan fans at times. Powell is the opposite, lovely rugby but no success. It's a tough choice picking between those two. I'd be inclined to go witth the proven winner, but easy to see him falling short and being unpopular. Or do you risk another NRL assistant coach? Perhaps better than Wane particularly as a coach, but likely to be short term, especially if successful as they'll get a job in the NRL and leave.

Needs to be some kind of context with Powell though. He took over a Cas side who were an average team. They finished second bottom the year before he took over and had 22 losses that season. He's turned them into a top 5 team and won the LLS whilst being 80 mins away from winning both the CC and the Grand Final. He also loses his best player every other season whilst not having the resources or facilities of any other the bigger clubs; Clark, Solomona, Hardaker, Gale. Since he was appointed coach in 2013 he has finished above us 4 times in 8 seasons.

Such is the life of a massive club, even guys that are proven winners elsewhere sometimes stumble in the bright lights of the big time and expectations are high so reputations count for little here if you don't deliver success. It happens at United, Real Madrid, Dallas Cowboys and in RL its us.

Proven winners that took over a SL club while peaking and took the steadily backwards and/or at least into off-field disrepute, Millward Noble McDermott, I’d say Wane did so too just avoiding the middle eights over Smiths Wire, redeeming some credit after with a GF.
I wouldn’t be looking at any of the ‘proven’ GF winners from above, but those who have excelled under limited resources, I’ve made no secret of John Kear, but you could perhaps add Powell, Anderson, Watson, you could argue a case for Luke Robinson and Andrew Henderson....if I had a magic wand it would have to be Trent Robinson, but I’d be almost as pleased with John Kear, you just cannot fault the guys record as much as the stick I get for it.

his record being?

I was nodding along in agreement and then came to John kear! Powell, Anderson and Watson have all done fantastic jobs at getting the best from their players and budget at their disposal and brought relative success to their clubs. I don't think mcdermott or wane could have done what those 3 managed at the clubs they were at. I fully agree go for Powell, Watson would have been great IMO, I think Anderson would do a job, all depends whether he wants it again really though, same with Henderson. The other problem with promoting from within is whether the players respond as well as they would if they had to impress someone they didn't know.

but Not John Kear.

His underdog cup wins at Sheffield and Hull and a superb record at Wakefield when he took over on a hiding to nothing and with little resources and permanent off field instability made them a competitive team.

When a coach gets multiple teams to punch above their weight he's probably a good coach.