The two sobering questions Parramatta cant answer

August 16, 2021 â€" 3.45pm

If not now, then when? If not Brad Arthur and these players, then who?

They are the two sobering questions Parramatta face no matter how many fluffy platitudes club officials say publicly nor how many recorded video messages players send to weary members apologising for inept performances.

The Eels’ late-season face-plant can no longer be dismissed as a rough patch. Teams often lose four straight, even the good ones.

Broken ones surrender, as the Eels did against Manly on Saturday night, and Arthur’s post-match media conference following the 56-10 loss exposed him as a coach bereft of answers.

“The defence and the scoreline, our start,” he muttered. “We are down on belief.”

A solution, he said, could be to focus less on “footy” at training heading into this Saturday night’s match against 14th-placed North Queensland at CBUS Super Stadium.

Parramatta coach Brad Arthur is under pressure to keep his job despite having board support.Credit:NRL Photos

Less footy? Perhaps a solution might be to focus more on “defence”, considering his side has conceded 124 points in three matches.

Against Manly, a public service announcement over the loudspeakers urged spectators in the first half to “maintain social distancing at all times”. The Eels outside backs must have thought that applied to them, too, providing yawning gaps for Manly players to run into.

So many fancy phrases have been added to the rugby league lexicon in recent years â€" “game management”, “eyes up footy”, “premiership window” â€" but the one at play at Parramatta right now is “changing the narrative”.

The current narrative goes something like this: it’s not Arthur’s fault, it’s the squad he’s got, a squad that’s “just OK”, a squad without a genuine superstar, without a true mongrel in the pack who won’t get bullied by rival forwards ...

That’s a distinct change in the narrative from a year ago, when premature rhetoric about this finally being the Eels’ season was being rolled out.

Now there’s talk of a roster overhaul, something that takes years to complete no matter how many players are coming off contract at the same time.

Consider Parramatta’s squad when its healthy and then ask if major surgery is required.

Clint Gutherson: three matches for NSW. Maika Sivo: top tryscorer in 2019. Dylan Brown: future superstar. Mitchell Moses â€" NSW debut this year, alleged future superstar. Nathan Brown: two matches for NSW. Ryan Matterson: NSW squad. Isaiah Papali’i: buy of the year. Reed Mahoney: would have played for Queensland if not for injury. Reagan Campbell-Gillard: one match for NSW. Junior Paulo: six matches for NSW and halfback in a prop’s body.

It’s a team most coaches would nurture, not overhaul, but if we’re looking to drop a superstar into that squad, then who? Munster? Tedesco? Cleary? Trbojevic?

Clint Gutherson’s try celebration has become redundant in recent weeks.Credit:Getty

The best players are at the best clubs, locked in tight and going nowhere. So maybe the Eels will have to work with what they’ve got.

Debate rages about Gutherson’s future, which says more about the NRL’s silly contract system because he isn’t off contract until 2023 and we haven’t even reached the finals for 2021.

Clearly, his wily old manager Sam Ayoub wanted to crack a deal when the Eels were flying earlier this year and Gutherson was reeling off the “Gutherino”, his hypnotic post-try celebration that’s now as dead as disco.

This wouldn’t be the time to be shopping him â€" to Parramatta or anyone.

Sure, parachuting a superstar into a capable roster can work. The Roosters signed Sonny Bill Williams in 2013 and won the premiership. Cooper Cronk was fundamental to their 2018 and 2019 titles, even if he played one with a broken wing.

But often it takes patience. The Sharks had Ben Barba but mostly grafted their way to a premiership in 2016, wearing down the Storm in the grand final.

North Queensland won their maiden premiership via Johnathan Thurston, a future Immortal, but they only secured him because the Bulldogs dropped the ball.

As for the Storm, history often forgets that Cameron Smith, Billy Slater and Cronk weren’t wanted by any club. The Broncos only tried to sign Smith when Melbourne came sniffing.

Greg Inglis was their genuine superstar signing but the Storm’s success has been built on Craig Bellamy and his coaching staff developing generations of players into premiership winners and representative players.

The Panthers are in a premiership sweet spot now, their window flung open, the wind gushing in, but their superstars-in-waiting come via a clear, professional pathway system â€" something the Eels are only starting to develop now.

Which brings us to the coach.

“If you can’t change the people, change the people,” Phil Gould jokes whenever asked if a club should sack the coach or change the roster.

Parramatta insist Arthur will see out the final year of his contract next season, which is usually as comforting for a coach as being on an inflatable mattress half a kilometre from the beach when the shark alarm sounds.

It’s impossible to not like Arthur. He navigated his side through the 2016 salary cap scandal. He’s earnest, grounded, doesn’t tell lies â€" but how long can Eels bosses wait for him to deliver the ultimate prize?

Souths coach Wayne Bennett might’ve been laying the groundwork for his next job when he questioned the game’s lack of coaching talent last Friday, but he was right.

“The players are out there,” Bennett said of a perceived lack of playing depth. “The problem is a lot of coaches aren’t getting the best out of what they’ve got. I don’t fear any of that at all. I know who’s under-performing and I know that guys aren’t getting opportunities. The good clubs help players and develop their talent. There are two or three clubs â€" without actually naming them â€" who I see do a great job every year with players that other clubs let go and all of a sudden, these guys resurface and play great football.”

In other words, instead of buying superstars, make some. Bennett has been linked to the Eels, with some believing he can do for the Eels just as he did for the Dragons in 2010, but he’s going home to Brisbane for family reasons.

The name being whispered around Parramatta is Trent Robinson, who is off contract at the end of next year but isn’t going anywhere. Robinson wants to create a dynasty at the Roosters, just as Bellamy has done for the Storm.

Who else could replace Arthur?

Experienced coaches like Paul Green and Shane Flanagan are on the market and have won grand finals, but both bring baggage from their previous jobs as head coaches.

Penrith’s Cameron Ciraldo is considered the next of the assistant coaches ripe for the picking, but would the Eels board seriously consider sacking Arthur to replace him with a rookie?

For now, Arthur’s saving grace is that Parramatta are no longer a club riven by factions with directors and management preoccupied with survival at forthcoming board elections.

One of the true blessings from the 2016 salary cap investigation was the change in governance, meaning directors won’t listen to the outside noise of members wanting coaches sacked and superstars signed just for the sake of securing votes.

The problem for Parramatta is they have backed their coach and his squad and are only just discovering the frightening reality that neither might not be enough to secure what they’ve always wanted.

Andrew Webster is Chief Sports Writer of The Sydney Morning Herald.

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