FOR former Leeds Rhinos head coach Rohan Smith, he stands by everything that he did at Headingley during his two-year stay.
The Australian left the club last month following a series of disappointing and inconsistent results.
But, Smith remains defiant that the Rhinos achieved a lot whilst he was in charge at the club.
“You can reflect on things and pick moments and decisions out but the alternative decision doesn’t necessarily mean it would have worked out better,” Smith told League Express.
“You do what’s right for the club at the time with the information that you have. Every decision was made with the best interest of what was happening at the time.
“There were lots of things that came up and a lot of things that happened in two years which were both good and bad which impacted how things happened on the field.
“There was a real commitment towards making decisions to assist the future and not make panic decisions in recruiting extra players or giving long-term deals to players that weren’t going to fit the mould in years to come.
“The benefit of hindsight is not very beneficial. You have look at foresight and why decisions were made.
“I think we accomplished a lot, particularly during pre-season in how we connected the group. We wanted to be a really good operating squad which previously we hadn’t been in previous seasons.
“It was very much the start of a new beginning. I thought we did a lot, there were a couple of performances short of being in a solid place to build off of towards the back end of the year.
For Leeds, a number of their results were closely fought – and lost – such as a 30-24 home loss to Huddersfield Giants in April and an 18-8 loss to St Helens in March.
So, why couldn’t Leeds get over the line on numerous occasions this season?
“There are a lot of small margins in sport and it has been a very closely fought Super League season – more so than others,” Smith continued.
“There are always moments in games that influence the outcome and I think the majority of games we were well and truly in the battle well into the second-half which is a pleasing thing.
“The ability to go on with it, however, we just didn’t play our best stuff for long enough in several games and that led to our ladder position being not quite where it needed to be.”
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