Axe Being Wielded At Manly?

[Graham]

Come the end of the season it looks like being all change at Manly.

 

So not long ago it looked like DCE was on his way, now he's staying as we know but other than that a big clear out is planned.

 

1st big casualty: Geoff Toovey the coach. He could have stayed if he's have accepted demotion. He said no to that.

 

Are you ready for this? Well 14 players being told they aren't wanted including:

Luke Burgess (NRL club? Japanese Rugby?)

Feliti Mateo (NRL club? Warriors are still paying some of his salary)

Willie Mason (whose recent form has been good to my eyes)

Josh Starling

Justin Horo (SL?)

Matt Balin - despite recently signing a new 2 year contract

Dunamis Lui (St George Illawarra?)

 

Toovey has a contract for next season with bonuses built in. He won't accept the demotion and a payout figure is being discussed.

 

Apparently all of the above has not been announced or officially confirmed by Manly.

[Farmduck]

Also on the block:

Hasson
Blair
Hodges
Littlejohn
Vave
Andrews

 

This leaves them with a bare 17 senior players and Tom Trbojevic is the only U20 player who has played first grade. This is a very bold move by Trent Barrett but could have been avoided if Manly had made some tough decisions a couple of years ago - offloading Watmough, Matai, Stewart, for example.

 

Very similar to the current Wests Tigers mess.

[Farmduck]

Feleti Mateo says he expects to be at Manly next NRL season and has declined to discuss a report that he is one of 14 players set to be shown the door.

 

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-07-22/feleti-mateo-says-he-intends-to-honour-final-year-of-manly-deal/6640340

[RabbitRhinoovOZ]

Every move this grot of a club makes just sickens me (Fire toovey a club legend who gave them more than anyone!), Wish they would merge with cronulla so I could focus all my hate in the one direction.

[RabbitRhinoovOZ]

I also suspect clubs like the West's,St george & Newcastle will be ravaged by manly in the near future, Tapow, Brooks etc will no doubt be in there sights.

[Farmduck]

Every move this grot of a club makes just sickens me (Fire toovey a club legend who gave them more than anyone!), Wish they would merge with cronulla so I could focus all my hate in the one direction.

 

Firing Toovey is one of the worst acts of club disloyalty towards a player that I've ever seen. Even as a Wests Magpies fan, I rated Toovey as one of my favourite players. Effectively blaming him for this year's performances is incredibly dishonest. For years they've concentrated most of their cap on a small core of star players. This year those players have all been injured and the backups have played like you'd expect them to play - like minimum-wage squad-fillers.

 

They don't even have the luxury this year of sending Glenn Stewart and Watmough out there on one leg to play for the glory of the team, when they both should have been spending time in the rehab squad.

 

It couldn't happen to a more deserving club.

[Graham]

 Manly have started negotiations with Brett Stewart to ensure the premiership-winning fullback finishes his career a one-club man.

Stewart is off contract at the end of 2016 but has indicated he is hopeful of continuing in the top grade into his mid-thirties. Having copped a savage backlash over the decision not to table Stewart's brother, Glenn, a contract extension last year,  Sea Eagles powerbrokers are keen to ensure there isn't a repeat in negotiations with the man dubbed "The Prince of Brookvale".

What's betting they make a dog's breakfast of this as well?

[Graham]

Under siege Manly coach Geoff Toovey says he and his Sea Eagles players have not received any indication from the club that up to 14 members of the squad are unwanted beyond the end of 2015.

Reports emerged on Tuesday evening that the northern beaches franchise had told 14 players, including fan favourite Matt Ballin and recent big name recruits Willie Mason and Feleti Mateo, that they were free to pursue employment elsewhere, while Toovey himself has long been expected to be moved on in favour of Panthers assistant Trent Barrett.

But speaking on NRL360 on Wednesday night after having a day to process the speculation, Toovey said neither he nor anyone in his squad had had the reports confirmed or denied by the club, before adding that he would be disappointed if there was substance to them.

[Graham]

Well it looks like he knows all about the situation now:

 

Manly and embattled coach Geoff Toovey have failed to reach a payout settlement.

Sea Eagles management met at 4.30pm on Monday to formally sack Toovey.

The axe will still drop on Toovey but he has been given a stay of execution for at least another 24 hours.

Toovey was expected to have a legal representative at Monday’s meeting.

 

Both parties discussed a financial payout but couldn’t quite finalise the deal.

That is expected to happen sometime Tuesday.

Toovey is then expected to front the media on Wednesday at Manly’s Narrabeen headquarters.

[Farmduck]

They made it official today:  http://www.seaeagles.com.au/news/2015/07/28/club_announcement_on.html

 

I've generally been against hiring former club champions because it's too hard to sack them when you need to. I'm still not convinced Manly had to sack him. I've written ad nauseam about what I considered the flaws in Manly's roster management and recruitment system and now it comes home to roost on Toovey's head.

 

This better not be player-driven. I saw a lot of Toovey's career and their current squad aren't fit to clean his shoes.

[longboard]

In team sports an attractive and simple response to under performance is to sack the coach. It doesn't work usually unless other things in a club change., eg analysing coaching and planning in the round, careful player recruitment..... 

 

Soccer clubs in the UK have a habit of sacking managers when form is poor. When the new managers come in they tend to want to sign a load of new payers and get rid of many of the existing ones. Genius! Thus the not so merry go round continues...

[Farmduck]

I understand the idea of blaming everything on the coach but how often do we see the sacked coach immediately picked up by another club? Are those clubs so desperate that they'll hire anyone? Or do they understand that failure is more complex?

 

Also, Toovey has a 58% win rate. Most teams would kill for a 58% win rate. Imagine the champagne flowing in the streets of Wakey if they ever got a 58% win rate.

[DiddyDave]

I think the departures of Watmough and Glenn Stewart,one club players up till then,at the end of last season,signalled that all was not well at Manly. Then the shenanigans in the first three months of the current campaign with DCE and Keiron Foran combined with Manly`s poor early season form,albeit not helped by a shocking run of injuries,has confirmed that the club is in a mess. Blaming Toovey for this,as has clearly happened,would appear to be a very simplistic decision that might come back to bite them in the backside should the appointment of Trent Barrett prove to be a case of jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. Strangely in all of this,I`ve not heard one word from the fans,they appear to have either been completely ignored,or for some reason they don`t really care,but knowing the passion I`ve seen from their fans at Manly games,it would appear the latter is clearly not the case.

Is there something badly amiss behind the scenes at Manly? If there is,Manly could become another basket case similar to the Eels of the last few years,time will only tell,but the achievements of Toovey as a player and coach speak for themselves. All the best for the future Tooves,you deserve it.  

[DiddyDave]

Postscript to my above input,if Toovey was on the way out,who then decided to get rid of certain players and why? Think I saw on NRL360 that there are seven people on Manly`s board,but only two from the rugby league side of the enterprise. What? Methinks Trent Barrett is in for a torrid first twelve months,he has no experience of coaching at the top level,virtually half a new playing squad and a possible cold shoulder from the remaining players who`ve had to endure a tough 2015 that`s seen some good mates pushed out as well as poor old Tooves. To me all this is a recipe for disaster,even the often stupid Warriors wouldn`t be daft enough to do this.