I'll try hard in the following days to be as charitable to Deans' future as some are here, and I mean that sincerely.
But for now, no.
Under JO'N Mk II and Deans Mk I huge damage has been done to the commercial and community strength of Australian rugby. These men were paid very large salaries and made multiple claims as to what was being achieved and definitely would be achieved on their privileged watches over this wonderful game in Australia.
Yet virtually every KPI that matters as to the strategic health of Australian rugby both in absolute and terms relative to other sporting codes here has materially worsened, from Wallaby trending crowd numbers to rugby's % code market share to community $ funding levels to the commercial solidity of our S15 teams, and so on.
To cap it all off, 83,000 fans paid huge individual seat prices on Saturday night to see an almost embarrassing Wallaby performance and a loss of the BIL series. The startling brevity of Pulver's paragraph above re Deans' achievements in his record-length engagement says it all.
By any standard, the recent performance of the most highly remunerated, senior members of the elite of our game in this country has been appalling. In a crucial era for Australian rugby, action was not taken adequately or rapidly enough to correct obvious and major problems in both Wallaby management and across the management of the code as a whole.
The recovery road that remains as a consequence will be long, hard and require serious investment. Given the state and depth of the damage done, a positive long-range outcome if far from guaranteed.
I am sorry, but my anger over this wholly avoidable state of affairs will burn on for a while yet. I am not ready to easily forgive until I see betterment and a true recovery for Australian rugby.