News Limited is reporting that the Wests Tigers have have decided to sack Mick Potter. He will either be sacked this week or the club will wait until the end of the season.
As is always the case at the Wests Tigers, player power and a flakey board is once again said to be the catalyst for the demise of their coach.
That the club employed Brian Smith to review the clubs operations says a lot. Smith is famous for not being able to coach a team to Grand Final success. He was hardly the best person to ask about the best way to run a club.
The Wests Tigers lineup has achieved a lot this season when you consider that many of their key players don’t have all that much experience.
Their best player this season has been a teenage halfback!
A club that makes the decision to sack a coach can’t just look at the win/loss column. It needs to look at the circumstances that coach is dealing with.
I think it is fair to say that Potter is coaching a side that has a number of players that are still developing into first graders. With youth comes inconsistency.
The Wests Tigers have had some great wins this season, improbable victories over premiership heavyweights. Those victories have all been powered by their young stars.
I don’t think Potter is a master coach by any stretch. Having said that, he is doing a very good, thankless job with a club that is in rebuilding mode.
What do the Wests Tigers players and board think they are supposed to be achieving with the lineup they have?
There are three type of coaches in Rugby League…
You have the master coaches who have proven time and time again that they can build a winning team no matter what the circumstances are.
You have the middle of the road coaches who depend on having talent, who get the job done, but who haven’t got that edge to their coaching that can turn a good team into a great team.
Then you have the bad coaches. The ones that make terrible decisions and actually hurt a teams performance and long term improvement.
Mick Potter is a middle of the road coach. You only replace Mick Potter if you know for certain you are getting a better coach to replace him. You don’t sack him to take a punt on an untried coach like David Kidwell.
