Looks like he is about to go fulltime with Australia.

Id like Tony to stay for the next 10 years, but if he has to go for his own reasons, how about Shaun Edwards ? come back to where his old dad played ?

IMO when that sad day arrives then we aim for the best, whether available or not, and if necessary gradually lower our sights from there. There is a good chance that when we're looking for a new coach we'll be in transition and replacing the old guard - that is not a good time to take a flyer on an unproven assistant whether from within or elsewhere.

I can only agree with 50% of your post Mr T. I would expect the club to be set up well and a bit more stable than you suggest when TS moves on. Although no one knows for certain, I don't think he is the kind of guy to leave us in the lurch.

If he was going to sign he would have signed by now, and I think he will leave us at the end of 2013 needing a rebuild. He will hope to go out on a last hurrah of a GF win with the "last chance saloon" squad members.

IF we win the GF next season, and IF Wigan, Saints or (IMO especially) Hull fall well short of what they would have expected then I can see him looking at it us as job done, and then 'that looks like a challenge I'd relish'.

whatever legacy tony smith leaves behind at your club apart from finally delivering some silverware to the place,i believe that his biggest achievement is in changing the culture of your club and that whoever eventually takes on the job will have had his hardest hurdle cleared for him by smith
tony smith has worked wonders at every club that he has been at and i sincerely hope that the warrington fans don't wish to see the back of him just yet as it's not too long ago that all you would have been good at was winning the yard of ale contest,gf success will come to you if you continue your improvements as a club without a doubt imo

Smith seems very settled at Warrington, in both the town and the club. I can see him abandoning his previous mantra and not moving on. He came in to Warrington to rebuild and turn you into champions and if anything that cycle is coming about again. Within 2 years he'll have to replace the core of your team and all it's key players with Hodgson, Briers, Monaghan, Higham, Morley, Carvell and Westwood all at the far end of their careers. IMO next season is easy, with the challenge being to get you over the finishing line. The next two years after that will be far more challenging. I can see him staying around to bring the Dwyers and Evans' etc through to being key players.

I hope that you are right and that was my point to Thelonius really...eloquently put Sir

Whether TS stays or goes is going to depend on his options elsewhere. Yes it might be time where he fancies a new challenge but he's also onto a good thing in Warrington with a good set up and a supportive board and structures below that he set up himself. There aren't a lot of places he can go that aren't a backwards move.

If an NRL club comes in for him then fair enough good luck to him, but there are no guarantees. He's been out of Australia for a long time and the call has never come so far for whatever reason. It's not like TS has only just started being a successful coach, he had a Grand Final and World Club Challenge title by early 2005. The relative lack of success of coaches like Matthew Elliott, Ian Millward and Shaun McRae in Australia after winning trophies in England probably count against Aussie coaches in Super League that have spent a long time here. Maguire went back quite quickly, but then he was already well known and highly rated as an assistant in the NRL and he didn't get forgotten about. Nathan Brown has kept his media profile up in Australia too. Tony Smith got UK citizenship and wasn't hankering for a move back home.

If no NRL club comes in for him then do we really expect him to leave? Where would he go to in the UK that is not a sideways or backwards move?

It's not cut and dried that he will move on. When people say 'he does a few years and moves on', there were obvious reasons for moving on before. Huddersfield to Leeds was moving to a big club with a shot of trophies. Leeds to GB was getting an international job. There isn't an obvious upwards move now unless its to the NRL.

Another interesting phenomenon with Smith is his previous SL clubs have done better after he left than when he was there!

I can't see Smith sprinting back to his homeland, tbh.
Since the inception of SL, the coaches who have been successful, and have gone to the NRL, have only gone as assistants. I don't see Smith wanting to be anyone's assistant.

Matty Elliott went back as an assistant
Likewise, Anderson and Millward. They all won plenty of pots.Yes, Maguire's gone back.
McRea had his success in the mid 90's, but went to a team who were a bit of a laughing stock, a decade later.

The NRL, rightly or wrongly, sneer at our game, and regard it as beneath them. I think Smith is a bit to "savvy" to go as an assistant, and the NRL clubs wouldn't want to give a head coach's job, to someone that's come from a "Pommie" team.

IF, and it's a big if, Smith goes, I think it'll be to Wigan. After all, they've never been backwards, when it comes to getting what they want (Andy Gregory, Andy Platt, Stuart Fielden...and breaking the salary cap, in the process)

If I was the RFL then I'd be offering TS a lot of money. He is the best coach in the country at the minute, and his knowledge and experience would be vital.

IIRC he has been involved with holding seminars for coaches, so he may be interested in some sort of technical role, but it's whether he would want to stay in coaching. If he does then I think Hull FC would be a likely option.

I feel certain that Tony Smith will stay until at least the end of 2014, and when he moves on, Brett Hodgson may well take over the reins.

The next generation of good Aussie coaches have to start coming through from somewhere and Hodgson's two-year deal will expire at the end in 2014. I think the next two years will be as much about grooming him for coaching as it will be him chiming into the line, getting his head ripped off and bisecting the sticks with effortless touchline conversions. He leads by example on the field, is a "talker" under the sticks and has the intelligence, experience and knowledge of the game necessary to make the step up to a successful coaching career.

In my eyes, it's not implausible that something like that could happen.

Time will tell.

Interesting, exactly the same thought occurred to me when I saw Hodgson's 2 year deal, they cleary want to keep him at the club and I can certainly see him as a coach.

Signed for TWO more years according to the Warrington Guardian tomorrow