Dean Young claimed Shane Flanagan told him he’d “had enough” as the new Dragons interim head coach opened up on a whirlwind 24 hours and his future plans for the club.
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Young was appointed to the role on Monday afternoon and did not take long to put his stamp on the team, even if he didn’t necessarily agree with framing it that way.
“We need change,” he instead told reporters.
That started with dropping Kyle Flanagan to the bench, where he will now serve as cover for both the halves and hooker Damien Cook with Jacob Liddle unavailable.
In Flanagan’s place is teenage halfback Kade Reed, who makes his long-awaited NRL debut albeit in less than ideal circumstances for the 0-7 Dragons.
When Young was told at 5.30pm on Monday that he would be taking over as Dragons coach for the remainder of the year, he set about doing three things.
First, he went home and told his wife to “buckle up”. Then, he apologised to his three kids about “what is going to happen next” and finally, he drove over to Reed’s house for what is the “best part of coaching”.
Young could have done it over the phone, but he wanted to explain to Reed’s parents in person that he was not throwing their son in the deep end.
Reed “will not be the saviour of this club”, as Young warned.
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Young explains change for Kyle Flanagan | 01:33
“He needs the 16 players that take the field on the weekend to do their job and then he’ll be able to do his,” Young added.
“I thought it was important that his parents understood the reason why I’m giving him the opportunity. People will probably judge my decision and say that we’re zero and seven and chucking in a kid on debut on Anzac Day is risky.
“But I wouldn’t do it unless I believed in him and I wanted him to know that I believe in him and that his parents fully knew that I’m in there for the long haul with him and he’s a big part of the future.”
Young said he has his own “opinions of why we’re in the position that we’re at” but added he would wait until after their Round 9 bye to “do things the way I want to do them”.
The Dragons premiership winner could sense Flanagan’s position as head coach may have been in jeopardy. After all, he’s been in the NRL since 2003.
“So I could see that things weren’t going the way that we all wanted to go,” he said.
“When that happens for a long period of time, clubs make change.
“I was prepared for whatever happened, but I was in there fighting as hard as I could with Shane until the end.”
Ultimately, Young said that Flanagan told him after the loss to the Rabbitohs that “he’s had enough”.
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Flanagan was not the only one to lose his job, with head of football Ben Haran also stepping down while Young also spoke about the “hard” decision to let go of assistant Michael Ennis.
“That one was hard, mate, to be honest,” Young said.
“As I said, the best part of coaching is giving kids their debut and the toughest part of the job is telling people that there’s no job here for them. I’ve known Mick for a long time. I played with him back in 2005.
“I’ve got a good relationship with him and unfortunately he’s part of the change. We need a circuit breaker. We need things to look different. We need things to feel different.
“I’ve got nothing against him as a coach. I think potentially he could be a good head coach down the track, but for me I need different voices. I need a playing group to feel different.”
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