How angry O’Brien botched $13m Brown moment; NRL’s embarrassing coach gag — Crawls

What on earth is Andrew Abdo thinking trying to gag coaches from talking about referees?

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We can only assume this means one of two things:

Either those Chinese war ships off the coast of Australia in recent weeks have secretly stormed the NRL and seized control.

Or the other alternative is even more frightening if the NRL honestly believes it has the power to rob our coaches of their rights to freedom of speech.

In all seriousness, this is a really embarrassing development for the game that Abdo not only feels the that the refs need to be protected from the truth, but that he also has the authority to stop coaches as experienced as Wayne Bennett, Craig Bellamy, Ricky Stuart, Des Hasler and Ivan Cleary from giving fans honest feedback after games.

Abdo should not need reminding that when Peter V’landys took charge as ARLC chairman in 2019 no one was gagging V’landys from talking about referees.

And the thing that won V’landys instant respect at the time was not just his promise to improve the standard of the refs, but also his honesty to come out publicly and call it as he saw it instead of all the politically correct bulls**t we had to constantly swallow during Todd Greenberg’s watch.

“That’s our single biggest problem at the moment,” V’landys conceded.

“You can’t have fans walking away thinking they’ve been ripped off.”

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But fast forward six years and now the plan to fix the problem is that we must silence the coaches in the hope that the controversies just go away.

If that is the case, why make coaches even turn up to their post-match commitments if they can’t speak the truth?

Go for your life getting rid of Graham Annesley’s weekly Monday briefing because let’s be honest, it bored us to tears anyway.

But please don’t turn the post-match media conferences into a snoozefest as well.

As long as coaches don’t question the integrity of the match officials, surely, they should be allowed to comment on decisions that have a bearing on the results of games.

In some ways what Abdo is trying to do here reminds me of the coach who introduces a booze ban thinking it is going to stop the players getting in strife.

But it often does the opposite and creates an even bigger drama as soon as someone steps out of line and breaks the ban.

I can’t wait to see how the likes of Hasler, Stuart and Trent Robinson react when they feel they have been robbed in the coming weeks.

Good luck stopping any of them from speaking their mind.

This is not about ref bashing. It’s simply about allowing everyone in the game, including the coaches, the right to an honest opinion.

O’BRIEN OWED KNIGHTS FANS AN EXPLANATION

Adam O’Brien sells himself short.

At his best the Newcastle coach comes across as an extremely down to earth and likeable bloke with an old-school footy mentality, not unlike his former Melbourne mentor Craig Bellamy.

But too often when O’Brien is standing in front of the camera it’s like he’s trying to either to act too tough or too angry.

O’Brien once again did himself no favours this week with his naive pre-match media conference on Wednesday, when he stood there and refused to answer questions about Dylan Brown.

Surely it wouldn’t have been that big a deal to make just a few short comments in the lead up to the game against the Dolphins.

After all, everyone else has already had their say on what is undoubtedly one of the biggest signing stories in the game’s history, including Knights legends Andrew and Matthew Johns along with Cooper Cronk, who have all questioned the decision to offer Brown a staggering $13 million over 10 years.

No doubt O’Brien has his reasons why he thinks it will work.

And if this is the signing that he believes could reinvent the Knights as a genuine premiership force, why would he want to hide from it?

Obviously someone also forgot to tell him that down the M1 at Parramatta Brown himself had already confirmed the story with his own statement on social media followed by a media stop.

O’Brien also may not realise that instead putting the story to bed for now, all he has really done is guarantee this will now drag into next week where the same reporters will be back asking the same questions.

He did a similar thing recently during a pre-match interview with Fox Sports’ sideline reporter Niko Pajarillo, when O’Brien didn’t want to talk about the potential make up of his halves this season.

O’Brien needs to cop the tip that when he is talking in front of a camera that he is actually talking to his own blue and red army as much as he is the media.

I often wonder if he’s trying too hard to be like his former Melbourne mentor but focuses too much on the cranky Bellyache we see in the coaching box.

And not enough on the Mr Knockabout Bellamy who also doesn’t mind sharing a joke and a laugh at his media conferences, while giving good honest answers to the majority of questions.

DOES COGGER NOW HOLD KEY TO O’BRIEN’S FUTURE?

The forgotten man in the Dylan Brown to Newcastle story is Jack Cogger.

It will be interesting to watch how Cogger responds when he runs out against the Dolphins.

Imagine being an NRL halfback and getting told this early in the season that his club has paid such massive overs to a five-eighth from another club to come and do his job next year?

I guess the irony here is that if the Knights don’t play finals footy this year you couldn’t guarantee Adam O’Brien’s job is safe anyway.

We all know that Cogger showed when he was at the Panthers that he was good enough to come on in a grand final and help change the game as Nathan Cleary’s halves partner.

WHAT SMITH’S ARRIVAL AT SOUTHS MEANS FOR MAMOUZELOS

Talk Brandon Smith is heading to South Sydney has put the blowtorch on Peter Mamouzelos heading into Saturday’s game against his former dummy half mentor, Damien Cook.

The young hooker has been waiting for several seasons now to step out of Cook’s shadow.

But almost as soon as Cook departed to the Dragons, now Mamouzelos has another giant shadow emerging in the shape of Smith who is expected to sign at Souths in the coming weeks.

What Mamouzelos has in his favour is that even when Smith returns from his knee injury and is back to 100 per cent fitness, the rugged Kiwi is still not an 80-minute dummy half.

So the key for Mamouzelos could be how well Jamie Humphreys plays at halfback.

If Humphreys keeps hold of the No. 7 jumper, with English import Lewis Dodd waiting in the wings, there will still be room for two hookers in Souths’ top 17.

ROOSTERS IN REAL DANGER AGAINST PANTHERS

After watching what the Broncos did to the Roosters in round one, there is genuine fear Friday night’s showdown with the reigning premiers could end up a cricket score.

Don’t forget the Roosters haven’t beaten the Panthers since 2019.

While the Roosters won’t stand a chance unless their forwards can match the Panthers’ big men in the middle, it was their edge defence last week that was just as concerning.

There is also going to be a lot of pressure on the Roosters halves and particularly Chad Townsend who goes head-to-head with Nathan Cleary.

I think I’ll be captaining Cleary in my SuperCoach team this week.

TIME FOR TIGERS’ ‘BEST SPINE’ TO LIVE UP TO RICHO’S HYPE

Shane Richardson came out in December and declared the Wests Tigers have the best spine in the NRL.

That being the case, the Tigers should be accounting for the Eels without Mitchell Moses if they are going to be a genuine top eight contender in 2025.

Even though it’s only round two, this is a massive game for Benji Marshall as much as it is his superstar signing Jarome Luai on the back of what was a bit of a disappointing loss to the Knights.

This week they get back Api Koroisau and Jahream Bula who didn’t play in round one, so we should really get a good gauge on what we can expect from the Tigers this season.

ARE BRONCOS WALKING INTO A RICKY STUART AMBUSH?

The Raiders have a huge chance to show us on Saturday that they are a fair dinkum contender this year when they host the Broncos.

Backing up from their impressive win over the Warriors in Vegas, it wouldn’t shock me one bit if Ricky Stuart has the Raiders fired up for an ambush given everyone outside the club doesn’t give them a hope yet again.

No doubt the fact the Raiders will be without inspirational skipper Joey Tapine and the lightning-fast Xavier Savage who are suspended is not going to help their cause.

But Stuart has shown plenty of times in the past that this is the type of adversity his teams thrive off.

I admit I struggle to see how Canberra has the power in the middle to handle Payne Haas and Pat Carrigan without Tapine leading the charge, while Savage’s X factor is a massive out.