Looking at Castleford's early season form they are reminiscent of us a few years ago, and Powell has taken them steadily forwards since he has been there. He had to deal with the disruption of losing Denny Solomona and they have taken it in their stride unlike us with Sandow.

Powell also had a good record before with Featherstone and it's between him and Wane as to who is the best of the British coaches. He should be a good shout for the next England coach.

So if we did part company with Smith he would be the best option to target, but I don't see it happening. Castleford has been his project for a few years and he has got them where he wants them now - a team with whom he can have a real go at winning trophies. To move to us now would seem like a step backwards.

If he does have half an eye on his next role, it will probably be Leeds, where he is Hetherington's mate, has a history with the club and probably would be his preferred role out of the big clubs. He will see Brian McDermott is vulnerable at Leeds and might have already a few off the record nudges that he is in their thoughts for being McDermott's successor. I seem to remember that back when he was replaced as Leeds coach in 2003 by Tony Smith, the original plan was for Smith to be coach for 2 years and then Powell to return in to the head coaching role, before he went off to RU for a while...?

We would have to look elsewhere if it wasn't Smith.

Your coach hasn't been sacked (yet), Powell has a job to do at Cas, and then we'll see what he does if he does decide to leave - but this seems a little premature for people to be discussing his next moves.

If We need a new coach after the Leigh game it won't be any currently employed head coach... and certainly not Powell.

So we should be looking at current assistants that have head coaching ambitions. ..
Personally I'd like to see Michael Monaghan given a shot.... after that I'm struggling. ..

Its just nonsense to think Powell will come here while riding high with Cas. ...

I would also like to see Michael Monaghan in charge. I couldn't care less if he hasn't got any experience of coaching a SL side... From what ive heard, he pretty much coached this side when he was here anyway.

Lets face it, we hardly have a dearth of coaching talent in this country do we? Only one i would be interested in is Powell and if he came here it would be purely for money.

The fans would get right behind Monaghan... it would give the place a lift... Give him 2/3 years and lets see how it goes.

back on Powell, he seems to be a good motivator AND an astute tactician.

You can look at that cas squad and think 'i dont fancy them' at quite a a few of their players. But he has them performing to a high standard and playing the best RL of their careers (probably). They are putting higher paid 'elite' players to shame.

I've seen people saying 'well warrington were playing like this a few years ago'.. and we were. Difference is Powell is doing it with other peoples cast offs and young talent. His recruitment is second to none.. We did it with probably the most expensively assembled squad in SL history... actually our current squad is probably the most expensively assembled in SL history.

How about Brett Hodgson? He is currently coaching the Widnes academy team and could be worth considering.

I think Hodgson was touted as a future coach before he fell out with Mr Smith.

Hmmmm. The Monas and Hodgson coaching magic didn't deliver much at Catalans last year, or Widnes errrrm well ever has it?

Appointing an untried, unproven rookie coach would be potential suicide I'm afraid.

If you want change, Geoff Toovey should be rescued from Bradford post haste then TS given some nice shiny job title and AN Other brought in as assistant. NEXT YEAR.

Recent history tells us that replacing the coach mid season is far from the panacea you all crave. Quite the opposite, be careful what you wish for.

We replaced Jimmy Lowes mid season and won the Challenge Cup a few months later.

Speaking of which, what happened to the bloke who always used to post those WG interviews on here?

How many GFs did he deliver and could he not have done better with the side that he had?

The only reason people say Monaghan is because they liked him as a player, but he wouldn't be coming back as a player he would be coming back as a rookie coach who hasn't had his first head coaching job to get his mistakes out of his system. Is Warrington the place for a rookie to learn from his mistakes...? It would be fine if we were a small club with modest ambitions but we are a club that has been near the top for the past few seasons so we need to win the Grand Final - not have more "near misses" or excuses like last season - we need a coach that can deliver the trophy at Old Trafford. Otherwise, we won't have improved on Tony Smith.

Now sure he might do "OK", like Keiron Cunningham is doing "OK" at Saints. Two seasons, two playoff appearances is pretty decent going for a rookie coach and he will get better the more time he has but look over at the Saints board at the calls for KC out. And KC is much more of a long standing Saints legend than Monaghan is with us.

The fans would get behind Monaghan - sure for a few weeks, but how long before the forum experts on here started pointing out his flaws - playing players in the wrong position, selection mistakes, being too negative, being too positive, he would soon be getting dissected on here and just doing what Cunningham has done at Saints and making the playoffs would be regarded as just a poor man's version of Tony Smith.

Good post. If anyone is going to make Warrington their rookie club, surely it would be Briers, rather than Monas. But just like how Giggs was overlooked for Mourino, will he have what it takes to step up. Based on Briers' coaching career, when might he be ready?

Briers could go to a club like Wakefield or Salford and then if he took them to be a club pushing the top sides like Powell has done with Cas he would be well set to come back to us and help us win the Grand Final.

Coaching Warrington should be something you earn, when you have proved you have what it takes to be a winner, not just a jobs for the boys culture, where players from Tony Smith's era of "nearly men" go on to replace him as coach, but end up achieving less than he did and leave the fans even more disillusioned.

some great posts on here ....
but the following were former assistant coaches and very much untried head coaches
Michael Mcguire:
he won the League leaders shield the grand final and the challenge cup in his first two years as a head coach. ..Wigan hadn't troubled those trophies much in the previous TEN years....

Shaun Wane:
a former assistant to an untried head coach, how we laughed at how quickly this idiot would fail, he won even more and added the world club champions to the list and his team spanked our teams backsides without breaking sweat last week...

Lee Radford:
untried head coach and former assistant won the Challenge cup and manager of the year with Hull FC

Paul Anderson:
untried head coach and former assistant won the League leaders shield and manager of the year with Huddersfield.

then there's the semi tried and tested head coaches:
Brian Mcdermott:
had what 4 or 5 years at Harlequins ....never reaching the play offs ...hows that for tried and .... yet he filled his boots with trophies at Leeds
Trent Robinson famously coached Toulouse to nothing at all... got manager of the year at Catalan and had the gall to go to the NRL and win an NRL grand final at the first stab....

however NRL super coaches Tim Sheens and Geoff Toovey are arsing about in the lower leagues, Rick Stone is having a good go at trying to get there and Brian Smith second time around version flirted with relegation and couldnt head home quick enough.

I'm failing to see any evidence which supports the notion of staying away from Assistant coaches they are guaranteed to win you nothing...