Yorkshire Carnegie
That was the year that was!
By Wildwillie
December 29 2014
It is not often that I read that we have been spanked at Headingley ( conceding 6 tries against Wuss = spanking in my book) and then get a warm glow from reading the thoughts of those who were at the game. Last weekend was such an occasion. We have been through some schizzle this season but finally the team, guided by TtT, delivered a performance which enthused the small but hardy band of Tykes supporters who assembled at Headingley on Saturday afternoon...
2014 - a strange year for the club, regressive some would say, has been and gone. Announcements have been made ( and not made ) by the club. Those that have been made vying with the occasional deafening silence for the accolade "most bizarre". We started the year on a high, playing exciting, entertaining rugby. The middle bit was decidedly strange - key people leaving to be either not replaced or too late to be effective. A firm hand on the tiller , necessary in any professional sports outfit, was missing at HC. A rebranding that alienated half the county and left the dwindling fanbase bemused and bewildered did not, in my opinion help to dispel the feeling that we were floundering both on and off the pitch.
The advent of Ming saw the team's performances plummet to a pretty sorry low. His gardening leave was inevitable and led, I believe, to the start of the recovery under the very able Tommy McGee. However we are in a worse position than we were last year at this time, both in the league and in terms of our playing staff.
Tommy McGee has a difficult job on his hands. He must improve our league position. He must also give our up and coming young players enough first team rugby to persuade them that HC is a good place to continue their rugby development.
So last year started well, was crap in the middle but improved slightly at the end. 2015 has to be better. Another backward step would be disasterous.. The recovery, already underway needs to continue this weekend at Richmond.
....
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05/01/2015 06:45
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2015:01:19:14:44:25 by Gelbel.
Back to the report. I find it harsh to criticise the club as a lot of what has happened is due to one person, i.e. J-Lo. He brought the good and the "nearly" in the Play-offs, but then ran off at short notice (albeit for very understandable reasons). It has been said that his return to RL was "inevitable", but I would argue that we would have expected an "organised" return to Rhinos and a transition period for a new RU Head Coach. If the club had gone for a quick-fix, cost saving, internal appointment this board would have been full of criticism. Mercer's appointment, and his stated aim of shoring up our defence (work-in-progress left by J-Lo) was very credible at the time (well I fell for it).
So why did Mercer fail? Was it:
1) He inherited the squad, no say in who was available
2) He was not a good motivator
3) Players liked and signed-up to J-Lo's adventurous play and rejected a negative approach
4) The nine players who left last season left a quality gap?
Answers on a postcard?
Still onwards and upwards. Unfortunately top 4 is unrealistic but we should be aiming at top half and building for next season
Obviously we can only speculate as to why Mercer failed. For me, while it sounded like he had the right ideas, chances are he probably just went the wrong way about trying to implement them.
And if the people who work for you (in this case the players) aren't on your side then you'll struggle to get anything done. Brian Clough at Leeds is probably the most famous example of this and I think Paul Sturrock had similar issues at Southampton.
Many said on this forum two years ago that we had a maturing team of talented youngsters and that 13/14 was a do or die season.
I asked exactly that question by email when J-Lo was interviewed on radio Leeds and he answered no it wasn't that, but he was wrong.
Nine talented players left, I suspect two of comparable quality came in, plus we have no loanees. IMHO this year was always going to be a transitional year.
