Don't fix it unless it's broken

[gold_on_black]

IMO tigers where just off the mark last year.
i mean they just lost both their semis by an inch to the 2 grand finalists of last year.
I don't quite understand tim sheens approach to rebuilding the whole make up of the team.

The tigers are a top 4 side with their current squad and they proved that last season.
Like a car that is running well you dont fix it unless it is broken. Yer you can maybe give it a paint job or add an exhaust for a bit of polish or noise but thats all.

I believe thats all the tigers needed to do maybe just one key signing and improve in an area they lacked last season. Maybe that was add a little more size to the pack.
so maybe getting rid of fifita and gibbs was a good move for blair and that will add a bit off polish to the tigers. and i think it should be left at that.

Or possibly should have developed a more permament fullback etc brought in mullaney or signed some one for next season.

But realistically are we going to have this cleanout everytime that we almost reach the gf and when we just miss out we havea big cleanout and try and offload all our players.

Just take a look at manly and saints. they have attempted to keep the same team and have been dominating for the past few seasons. they have developed a dominant side and stuck by them and only made changes when needed and it has proved neccesary. etc salary constraints manlys loss of orford and then hodkinson and dragons loss of costigan and smith.

The bulldogs and roosters are 2 teams who have bought a good team and then had short term success and failed….look at the bulldogs roosters rabbits bought not bred policy...these teams keep buying players to fix their problems but it is only a short term fix.

IMO. the dragons manly broncos and storm have always stuck strong with their roster other than salary cap contraints and have been dominant the past few years.
these four teams didnt start with champion players to build a champion team, they first had a champion team and the players then became the champions...lets be honest half the manly broncos and dragons players would not be in rep sides if their team was losing.

 

[system]

We made it one week from the GF based on a hot streak of form, not consistent week in week out footy.

It was a great ride no doubt but that exact routine of inconsistant football requiring large back of season winning streaks to play finals football saw us miss out on the finals for the four years following our premiership win.

Last year in particular we were bought in screaming to the back end of the season by the players we are keeping and not the ones that have already been released or talked about being released with the exception being Heighno who gave everything every week.

As a fan base the 2005 victory gave us a massively imflated view of the talent within our side

 

[Tiger_Watto]

I think you will find the competition has changed from 2010… New rules and repetitive injuries are effecting us badly, followed by a few teams going to a new level. The Tigers are a long way off the pace and its obvious changes need to be made.

I still feel we will make the 8, but I think we will only be apart of week 1\. Do we sit back at the end of the year and assess how far off the pace we really are, or do we have real pulse check during the year while new players and options are available to bring in for 2012???

Mediocrecy has been our biggest problem... A change of the guard may see a new culture of perform or be banished??!!!

 

[hadds75]

I agree to a strong extent.

BUT, A question which I think some people need to answer is - how good were we really last year? Yes we came 4th, but were we any better than 8th?

Also keep in mind we had NO injuries last year hardly at all (a few at the end was it)… while alot of teams like manly were injury depleted, and obviously Melbourne werent in the competition.

I thought we were good last year but I still think we had some real obvious defincies. In the semis I felt the Roosters and Dragons packs dominated us. We survived on heart and adrenaline (which unfortunately you cant play at that intensity every nrl week). The roosters and dragons packs were making FAR more metres in the semis vs us, and there dummy half runners (there back 3), made our back 3 look very slow and while Brown was very safe, you need your fullback to be playing pivotal role in attack. Also our lack of kicking game was why we were a class below a few other sides.

So there the areas Id of looked to fix, but the cleanout hasnt addressed really much of this, yet anyway.

 

[GNR4LIFE]

they've had 6 yrs to get their act together and are now paying the price for the medicority they have served up yr after yr.1 decent yr shouldn't save them from the axe.They were floundering for the previous 5 yrs before hand and are once again back in the same position this yr.The place is over-due for a clean-out and removal of some deadwood and its finally happening.Some new faces next yr will breath new life into the squad and hopefully an injection of hunger

 

[innsaneink]

The shift in direction has occurred after the season began…..once Sheens was re-signed.
Theyve decide to write off this year.
Sacrifice an entire season....all while asking fans to become members....pretty damned weak imo.

 

[hybrid_tiger]

As a fan base the 2005 victory gave us a massively imflated view of the talent within our side

Could not agree more with this. It truly was a run of about 13 or 14 games of form that has been the worst thing to happen to this side for the following six seasons.

We have two superstars in our side (Benji and Ellis) and a handful of elite players (Farah, Lawrence, Galloway, Lote). They are not going anywhere. We are not losing superstars people. We have our elite players wrapped up.

The only potential long term loss from the players we are rumoured to be letting go may be Fifita and from all reports he has a poor attitude and may not develop into the player his talent suggests he should.

 

[Tiger_Watto]

The shift in direction has occurred after the season began…..once Sheens was re-signed.

Exactly… I would love to know what was discussed in the 3 hour meeting prior to him Re-signing???

He obviously put a new business plan on the table and the club was sold it was the best direction to take. I wonder if things dont turn around early next year, Mr Sheen is shown the door???

 

[gold_on_black]

I understand we did have an injury free period and a great run home but at the same time at the start of this season the players stated they were well aware that they have the potential to play at that level week in week out and they should be able to. The players definately have the potential they just need to build consistency and every coach in the game says consistency comes from playing with the same guys week in week out and knowing each others games well with experienced players which the tigers have been building towards.
At the start of the year the players where saying they saw improvement and where aiming at the minor premiership as they had the belief in their ability.

Also i do have to agree that injuries have plagued us…just with the inclusion of lote and lawrence we definately would have won a few games there.

I just hope with the cleanout we are able to keep a core group of players ...guys like lawrence, ellis, benji, robbie, heighno, galloway and lote are blokes who have true belief in the jersey and are the leaders in this team

 

[system]

I just hope with the cleanout we are able to keep a core group of players …guys like lawrence, ellis, benji, robbie, heighno, galloway and lote are blokes who have true belief in the jersey and are the leaders in this team

That is my hope to.

Bring the young guys and recruits into this side with those men as the example of attitude, pride and professionalism to follow

 

[innsaneink]

The shift in direction has occurred after the season began…..once Sheens was re-signed.

Exactly… I would love to know what was discussed in the 3 hour meeting prior to him Re-signing???

He obviously put a new business plan on the table and the club was sold it was the best direction to take. I wonder if things dont turn around early next year, Mr Sheen is shown the door???

I doubt it….it'll be some three year plan of sorts, Im guessing the majority of our new recruits will be juniors from within.
Its good to see change, but boy they sure have funny timing.....we put up with four straight years of crap ....then last year get to the prelim final and a few months later it ''dont let the door......etc etc''. to half the squad it seems.
Surely it couldve been handled better.

Im just glad I didnt back em for the premiership....Im sure many that did arent so confident now.

 

[hybrid_tiger]

Hard to argue with that Ink…if anything this should have happened three years ago at least.

Better late than never I guess. Personally I would have liked to see the current squad under a new coach...

 

[Snake]

The shift in direction has occurred after the season began…..once Sheens was re-signed.

Exactly… I would love to know what was discussed in the 3 hour meeting prior to him Re-signing???

He obviously put a new business plan on the table and the club was sold it was the best direction to take. I wonder if things dont turn around early next year, Mr Sheen is shown the door???

I rekon thats what happened ..it will be a interesting to see who will become the new trainer/conditioner,whether Gentle is moving on and who would be the new assisstant coaches. I have no problem when all of this happened as it revolved around Sheens new gig..but if there wasn't a clean out Sheens wouldn't of got to mid season next year IMO he needs new blood to work his magic! well lets hope..I,m expecting next years team to be one of the youngest in the league.

 

[happy_tiger]

As I was saying in another thread to Cunno Sheens may have some KPI's now to contend with Might explain a lot of things don't you think ??

 

[cunno]

The shift in direction has occurred after the season began…..once Sheens was re-signed.

Exactly… I would love to know what was discussed in the 3 hour meeting prior to him Re-signing???

He obviously put a new business plan on the table and the club was sold it was the best direction to take. I wonder if things dont turn around early next year, Mr Sheen is shown the door???

I rekon thats what happened ..it will be a interesting to see who will become the new trainer/conditioner,whether Gentle is moving on and who would be the new assisstant coaches. I have no problem when all of this happened as it revolved around Sheens new gig..but if there wasn't a clean out Sheens wouldn't of got to mid season next year IMO he needs new blood to work his magic! well lets hope..I,m expecting next years team to be one of the youngest in the league.

Agree with the KPIs thought and Todd Payten could be an assistant coach.

 

[Eddie]

I personally am a little baffled and think it is a little more complicated than clearing out dead wood. I think we are probably in salary cap trouble along with trying to re jig the squad. Which is proving quite destabilising and a little bit of an embarrassing rumour mill. I agree that we do over estimate the talent within the squad overall. I agree that the squad as a whole shouldn't be whinging and moaning given their overall results over a 5 year period.

However I feel since 2009 we have actually been going in the right direction. Signed marquee players in Tuqiri and Ellis. Locked up most our established stars. We finished 2009 blazing and last season we were a point off the grand final and many, many experts had us winning the premiership this season.

We are 7-8 this year and in pretty familiar mid table mediocrity. However I don't think its been disgraceful by any means. We have missed out whole left edge all season. Include them and I guarantee thats another 2 wins there that get us to 9-6 and in that Top 5 or 6 clearing ahead of the pack. Small details decide each season.

My preference, and perhaps a much easier solution would have been to have much of the current squad under a different coach. However the last 2 years I barely mention Sheens anymore. I don't see the point. He is here and he aint going anywhere. He is a good coach however out inconsistency in attitude over the years reeks of a stale club. My hopes were momentarily spiked when Penrith came in, but soon dashed.

 

[Twodogs]

Yeah I agree that it's more than a cleanout. After all, we've added Galloway, Ellis and Tuquiri to strengthen the side, but they dropped the ball last year by not signing anyone new. It does not account for 7-8 players getting turfed at once. I wondered out aloud at the time how they could afford Tiquiri knowing his likely price. It looks like they blew the cap on it and are still making amends.

 

[Flippedy]

Hard to argue with that Ink…if anything this should have happened three years ago at least.

Better late than never I guess. **Personally I would have liked to see the current squad under a new coach..**.

Yep, this ONE change would have been a lot less disruptive and would probably do the team wonders!

 

[tigers05]

the cleanout is needed, there are a number of boys that should move on to allow recruitment and development to happen. Im sure wee will come out the other end better and stronger

 

[Winnipeg]

I also thought we were on the right track after last year. We were so close!

but I guess we can only judge after next year, when the new squad is assembled. The whole situation does seem to have ruined 2011 though.