McRae probably won't get a head coach's job again. He is getting on a bit and seems to have health problems.

He might stay around in the game though, he's good at media work and I would actually quite like McRae involved as an administrator of the game, he's a good bloke, down to earth, means well for the game.

It has become fashionable to make fun of McRae now he's at Salford, but he was the coach who finally broke Wigan's long reign of terror by getting Saints to that first double in 1996 (or maybe that's why we don't like him, because he started off Saints era of success...). He also did a good job at Hull when you think of where they were the year before he took over, and I remember him standing up and speaking out about the thug element at Hull in the early days which Shane Richardson seemed to largely root out.

I just don't get the "love-in" for McRae
He was a lucky man at the right time to get the Stains job. The players were allready in situ, and Stains had hounded out McLennan, when they were really progressing.
Wigan's empire was showing the first signs of cracking
The Bradford juggernaut was getting into 4th gear
Leeds weren't THAT good at the time
....and we finished 5th that 1st year of Super League
Within 2 years, Stains had imploded to a certain degree, until Hanley then Millward came in.
After that, he's treaded water with GatesHull, then he's been swimming for his life ever since.

To be fair, everybody connected with Rugby League, means well for the game, doesn't mean he needs to be employed.

Maybe I've got primrose and blue tinted specs on, but I've had a dislike for him since Stains beat us in the cup, away, in '98, by something like 20 points (this was after we'd gone there in 2 previous years and had 80, 56 and 60odd put past us), and the fat one's interview to the camera was "well, if that's RL, I want out, Warrington were lying on all game, and it's a disgrace". WHAT THE F DID HE WANT US TO DO, IN A KNOCKOUT GAME, AT A GROUND WHERE WE'D HAD 3 KICKINGS WITHIN 2 YEARS....ROLL OVER, AND LET THEM RUN UP ANOTHER CRICKET SCORE. RL got precious little mainstream coverage then, and having the Fat One belittle the game on national TV, didn't do us many favours. Maybe Lowes should go to Salford (where he should have got the job in the first place - and it would have saved him from coming here)

Well he won two Challenge Cups and a SL title in his first two seasons at Saints.

Hull were at the bottom of the league before he took over, he got them to being a strong side, the closest challengers to the 'big 4' at the time. You get people saying "well that was because he inherited Gateshead's players" - please....Gateshead did not have great players, they were basically a side like Crusaders last year, Aussie journeymen who were playoff material but no better. Their best player Willie Peters joined Wigan anyway. McRae had those Gateshead guys for a year then he moved them on because he went for young players on Hull's books - Horne, Cooke and Yeaman, he brought them all through and then he found good prospects in other clubs reserves like Carvell and Raynor. I thought he put a good side together with guys like Prescott, Jason and Tony Smith, Graham Mackay, Colin Best. It's harsh to say Hull were 'treading water' during his time, they were much improved on where they had been in the years before.

This "lucky coach" argument doesn't stack up because it is used about too many coaches, Noble, Millward and so on. When I used to argue the case for Ellery Hanley people said ah yes but he inherited a great team from McRae!

Chris Joynt does share your enthusiasm for McRae, sal.

Selective memory sally? or just going a bit senile in your older years?



He didn't inherit those players, he was inherited by Hull along with those players. McRae was the Gateshead coach. A team which finished 2 points outside of the then top-5 playoff system.

Also, those players that moved to Hull from Gateshead were better players than Hull had at the time, hence they moved in to the Boulevard with McRae.

McRae is a capable coach. There are a lot of coaches who have gone from being very successful to being no-so-successful. McRae to Gateshead/Hull/Salford. Millward to Wigan. Noble from Bradford to Wigan. It's not always as simple as putting a coach in with a good squad and getting the results, the two have to mix together and work well together, sometimes, for whatever reason, that mix of squad/coach may not work despite there being sufficient quality in both elements.

That's, erm, what Sally was saying.

Anyway, agree that McRae was a good coach at the beginning of Super League and made teams better. I think coaching has moved on from the things he knows best now, but there's no doubt he's a good guy and doesn't deserve to cop a load of abuse. He is enthusiastic about RL and talks well about the game on TV.

Yeah I've just re-read my post... I didn't make it clear, I wasn't disagreeing with sal's overall point, only the circumstances surrounding the Gateshull thing.

There are a lot of good coaches who if you put them in charge of Souths and Salford, would have the shine taken off their image.

Remember when Tony Smith was England coach in the World Cup, how much flak he got, all those theories that went around that Smith just picked his favourites, and he allowed cliques to develop in the squad, and the general verdict was "good coach at club level but he can't step up to the international arena". How about give Tony Smith the Kangaroos or Kiwis squad and see what happens then. I bet he would suddenly discover how to step up to the international arena!

In fact I can remember back a few years ago when he was at Huddersfield, he was not exactly Mr Popular with our club's fans, people on forums used to say he was just a dirty coach who used dirty spoiling tactics and coached a dirty team (and Huddersfield's image did clean up a bit when Jon Sharp took over and got rid of some of Smith's hardmen like Bloem and Gannon).

I reckon a good yardstick is if a coach can go to two clubs and improve them from where they were before. If they can do it twice, it's not a fluke. Smith has done that superbly with Leeds and us. McRae gets the benefit of the doubt for me because he did it at Saints and Hull. Noble has done it at Bradford and Crusaders (maybe Wigan too). Kear did it at Sheffield, Hull and Wakefield. But then the jury is still out on Mick Potter - great at Catalans. Saints....so so.

Here's the biggest issue people will have, what a coach wants and what a fan wants are totally different, as proved on here a few weeks back with people trying to fit tonys words around their own needs for warrington.

Its the "soccer fan culture" that spills over into general culture by the popular media, you win and the players are gods, you lose and the manager doesn't know what he's doing. And we know this because the journalists tell us so.

Thing is, If Lowes had have been a success (I know, bare with me) we'd have all said how that's what was needed after Cull, somebody who was more straight talking, less pally and all that.

It's like football, Sven was great - 'The Ice Cold Swede' who you couldn't flap then we lost a couple of QF's and he didn't care, he looked unmoved on the sidelines. Get an English coach, someone with passion, so we send for McLaren and a few 'Stevie G' & various other nicknames later he's the 'Wally with the Brolly' so there's a clamour for discipline, too much of a mates club, JT this, Lamps that so we pay the cash and get Capello, a disastrous World Cup later the world has decided that he's too tough, players can't relate to him.

If you're not winning, you're gash.

[iIt's like football, Sven was great - 'The Ice Cold Swede' who you couldn't flap then we lost a couple of QF's and he didn't care, he looked unmoved on the sidelines. Get an English coach, someone with passion, so we send for McLaren and a few 'Stevie G' & various other nicknames later he's the 'Wally with the Brolly' so there's a clamour for discipline, too much of a mates club, JT this, Lamps that so we pay the cash and get Capello, a disastrous World Cup later the world has decided that he's too tough, players can't relate to him.[/i

I agree up to a point, it is slightly jaundiced by the fact that top flight football is all about player power. The wage they command in the Premiership has led to a situation where they can take or leave International football. Certainly the amount of respect shown to the English coach by the players has decreased dramatically over the past 10 years. (the media have always haranged the English coach, this will never change). Look at the amount of players who now 'retire' early for playing for their national team, they don't need/want it.

Thankfully RL is a different beast all together, (for now).