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The Kiwis have finally got their man (and no, we’re not talking about Jason Taumalolo).
According to the New Zealand Herald, the Kiwis today officially announced the signing of former Rabbitohs coach Michael Maguire as their new head coach.
Maguire has signed on through the 2021 Rugby League World Cup.
Maguire coached the Rabbitohs for six seasons, winning the NRL Grand Final in 2014.
Having tried and failed with a rookie coach for the New Zealand Test team, the NZRL are expected to look towards a more experienced campaigner to take over. And there’s reportedly at least one successful club coach putting his name forward.
According to Channel 7’s Josh Massoud, former Sea Eagles coach Geoff Toovey has submitted an application for the vacant Kiwis head coaching position.
Applications close tomorrow.
Former Rabbitohs coach Michael Maguire has also previously been linked to the role.
Toovey coached the Sea Eagles for four seasons, making one Grand Final, two Preliminary Finals, and three Top 4 finishes. He has a career winning percentage of 58.1%.
For a start, we hate the term ‘Tier 2 nation’ in the first place (could Australia, New Zealand and England be any more condescending?) but given the tier structure’s entanglement in international eligibility, we don’t really have a choice. One day, however, we hope that won’t be the case.
And that day may come that little bit sooner, if Kangaroos coach Mal Meninga has anything to do with it. According to SMH, Meninga has suggested a radical change to Test payments, in order to encourage players to stick with the so-called ‘Tier 2 nations’.
Specifically, Meninga has put forward the idea that Australia – and, necessarily, New Zealand and England – give up their rich match payments, and have them placed into a pool, where they’d then be awarded to participants based on results.
Should New Zealand and England agree, this would be a giant step in the right direction, as it would give a team like Tonga, for example, the opportunity to not only match, but potentially out-earn a ‘Tier 1’ team like New Zealand, if they were to beat them – as they did at last year’s Rugby League World Cup.
We love the idea, but would argue it actually doesn’t go far enough. Making the payments performance-related isn’t a huge risk for the Kangaroos, who have relatively little decent competition as it is. Given their half-century long dominance, Australia would no doubt be understandably confident of winning the money back.
In a perfect world, the NRL would fund equal Test payments for all the Southern Hemisphere teams, at whatever number the game can afford. As the only major professional competition in the region, the NRL inevitably pillages the Pacific Islands of their best talent, and as a result has a moral obligation to fund those nations, as the de facto guardian for the sport in the Southern Hemisphere (likewise the RFL in the Northern Hemisphere).
The fact that the NRL hasn’t done so already is disappointing, and when they’ve then turned the pay disparity into an opportunity to poach home-grown Pacific talent like Semi Radradra and Akuila Uate on ‘residency’ grounds, it’s down-right offensive (think about it for a moment; quite literally every single top-flight Pacific Island player will inevitably become Australian or New Zealander on residency, by virtue of the fact that they’re the only two places in the region that you can play professional rugby league).
You could (and we do) argue that the ‘Tier 1’ nations shouldn’t be picking dual-eligible players in the first place, in order to encourage competitive balance; but we understand that that’s likely a bridge too far (at least at the moment).
In the meantime, addressing the pay disparity will go a long way to correcting the problem, by removing the financial sacrifices players have to make in opting for their country of heritage.
Meninga’s suggestion isn’t perfect, but it’s a huge leap forward.
Following today’s release of the NZRL’s scathing internal review of their Rugby League World Cup failure, the next question on New Zealanders’ lips is: who’ll be the next coach?
According to Brent Read on Triple M, the job is expected to go to Broncos assistant coach Jason Demetriou.
Demetriou is considered a decent NRL coach-in-waiting, and was interviewed last year for the Titans job (that eventually went to Garth Brennan).
There’s an obvious link to the Kiwis with Demetriou being an assistant to Wayne Bennett, who oversaw Stephen Kearney and the Kiwis 2008 World Cup triumph. However, the main appeal is Demetriou’s apparent connection to Tongan defector Jason Taumalolo, from his time in North Queensland.
The Kiwis are reportedly desperate to lure Taumalolo back, and think that Demetriou could help them do that.
As embarrassing as losing to Tonga was, it’s a bit disappointing for the Kiwis to respond by trying to bring back Tonga’s best player, given that strong Pacific Test teams are the best things to happen to international rugby league in years.
But desperate times call for desperate measures, and that’s certainly one way to get better than Tonga.
If your name is David Kidwell (or Alex Hayton, or if you’re from New Zealand at all), you might want to look away now.
According to the NZ Herald, the NZRL’s much anticipated internal review into their Rugby League World Cup failure is set to be released on Friday… and it’s not good.
The “damning review” is said to criticise the Kiwis’ entire operation from the top down, specifically pointing to “a lack of direction and poor decision-making from the front office”.
Former CEO Hayton spared himself the embarrassment of being sacked by resigning last week, and following this report, it appears certain that the off-contract Kidwell will also be replaced.
For those of you who are curious about exactly what went wrong, or those who just enjoy the finer details of other people’s misfortune (I believe it’s called ‘scadenfreude’), be sure to keep an eye out for the report.
It should be an interesting read.