Quote: carl_spackler "The squad was believed to be good enough for top 6 at the start of the season, but then they realised it wasn't good enough. It certainly should be better than 12th. If you and the coaches honestly thought it should be top 6 and now think 12th is not a major underachievement you need to consider whether you should be involved in the sport.'"
He said they expect the squad to be top 6 but as the season went on some deficiencies became apparent. Basically the poor performances of the halves reading between the lines. Don't see much controversial there? Oh - and he specifically states that we've underachieved (at around 30 seconds in) and then goes on to call the season 'awful' at around 2mins 50secs.
Quote: carl_spackler "The stuff about needing a local coach to understand how to bring youngsters through and it not being possible with an Australian is just so out there it's hard to comprehend how he thinks people will swallow it. As others have already mentioned, it just doesn't stack up with how many young kids Gentle played, either. Plus, I personally think that when Gentle was in charge the youngsters coming in looked more at ease than those who have come in this year (possibly Lancaster apart). I found myself wondering whether he was knowingly talking baloney as an excuse, genuine believed it under his own steam, or has simply swallowed it wholesale from somebody creating themselves a job opportunity.
Also, the comment about every time we had an injury he was asked for a loan instead of playing youngsters. How many loan players did we have in the last 2 years? I can think of Russell (we had no other fullback in the squad IIRC), and Foster. Any others? Also, this year we might not have brought in loans to cover injuries, but we did hand out full contracts to both Carvell and Colbon to cover injuries. Was that any better?'"
This is the bit of the interview I struggle with TBH. I don't see any evidence of a general reluctance among Aussie coaches to playing youngsters where required/appropriate and not specifically with Gentle either. Very odd. The comment about loan players could be taken as meaning he was asked to provide them, refused, and youngsters were used reluctantly instead I suppose.
Quote: carl_spackler "Then there was a claim about the unacceptable form last year. The 5 game losing run he claimed - didn't entirely happen, we won a cup game during it. We also only lost a couple of those 5 by 2 points or less, and a couple of others by 6 and 7 points. Have a look at this year's fixture list, Adam, you might see a 4 game losing streak already, where the closest we got was 7 points, and in a couple of weeks I think you might even find this to be the middle of a 5 game losing streak where the best we can manage is a 6 point gap. I suppose that's all Gentle & McRae's fault still though, eh?'"
At no point does he hold this year up as being better than last year. He mentioned the poor performances at the end of last season - including the losing run - as a reason why despite a top 6 finish and a CC final appearance he still felt that things were not right.
Quote: carl_spackler "Don't entirely agree about Radford's signings being better so far, either. Jury's still got to be out on that one. A similar mixed bag this season and we'll have to wait and see next year.'"
I think they're better in so far as they haven't wasted as much cap on ordinary players. In terms of quality there are still some question marks I agree.
Quote: carl_spackler "I also wish he'd stop (or at least tone down) going on about the refereeing now. He makes it sound like better refereeing would have us in the playoffs and it just smacks of 'they're out to get us, it's not our fault' excuses.'"
This simply isn't true. All through the interview he brings up poor game management and a sub-standard kicking game as the main reason we've struggled and specifically states these as the reason we lost so many close games. The only two games where he mentions the refs calls as factors are Wire and Saints.
Quote: carl_spackler "He has some valid points, but trying to attribute all of the problems to the previous regime and paint them as the ultimate villains of the piece just doesn't wash IMO.'"
He also blamed himself for letting Gentle/McRae make such a mess of things.
