When a coach or a valuable players leaves a club I see it as a fracture that needs to heal. By Sampson leaving and the club ‘upgrading’ to Cron I see a club trying to grow beyond its time. Realistically the club is 2 years young and hasn’t developed its culture and core. Is Cron really an upgrade from a culture perspective?
In reality, the Western Force is in it's 17th year, as shown by the continuous involvement by Matt Hodgson, the Director of Rugby who has been with the club from Year 1. There has not been a year that the club has missed playing professional rugby - but it did have it's Super Rugby licence cancelled for a period.
Tim Sampson is completing his 5th year as coach. Tim is a top bloke who has done a great job leading the player group and support staff through ever-changing times. Tim had an 88% winning record in GRR, but only a 22% winning record in Super Rugby. I can understand the club looking at all options at the time of his contract renewal.
There is plenty of time for a pre-season transition and recruitment with
Simon Cron into the 2023 Super Rugby season.
There is a strong/experienced Assistant Coaching and support group that is more than good enough to help take the player group to the next level including:
Mark Ozich – Attack Coach (Hawke's Bay);
Paul Tito – Forwards Coach (Taranaki/Pau);
Nick Hensley – Defence Coach (Nthn Suburbs/WForce);
Anthony Cutrupi – Head of Athletic Performance (Waratahs);
Hal Marsden – Strength, Power & Rehab (Melb Storm);
Dylan Parsons – Skills Coach/WF & Academy (RugbyWA);
Chris Goodman – GM Fortescue Academy (Crusaders).
There is a continuity of culture throughout that period that has only been strengthened through adversity but also the challenges and opportunities offered by the international involvement 2018 - early 2020 - that has not been available to any other Aussie franchise.
There is a strong Fortescue Academy that has a mixture of local WA lads and some of the best U20 players in Australia who have been involved in the current pre-season and will have had a full season under Tim Sampson et al.
In preparation for the possible impact of Covid during 2022, the pre-season included involvement from a similar sized group of Perth club rugby players who could be drawn upon if required.
The current squad still includes 2 players (Prior & Stander - both in their 9th season in the West) who stayed with the WF during the 2017 axing by RA but it's also has very experienced International players in Holmes, Kahui and Thrush who have taken on specialist skills coaching roles with the main group, Academy players and WA state under-age representative players.
The WF has had the challenge of developing its GRR player group to play in Super Rugby Au, TT and Pacifica during Covid times. Does anybody think that that has been easy? I reckon we all know that adversity can be a great team builder. This is the player group that had to live away from home for 11+ weeks during Covid lock-downs in 2020 and in 2022 had to play 4 of its first 5 games away with 4 x 6-day change-overs which included travel. It's a well-meshed player group from the 50 Test player down to the club rugby players.
2 years young? I don't think so! It has a 17 year history and a well-developed culture and core (driven by the player group).
Valuable players leaving the club? The WF has averaged 8-10 player changes each year. Rodda has signed for 2 more seasons.
Playing in it's 3rd year of Covid impacted Super Rugby? - certainly.
Is there a need to develop a Super Rugby winning culture? - absolutely.
I reckon that Simon Cron and the rest of the WF team have a chance to develop that together - starting in September 2022.
The new Head Coach certainly also has the opportunity to modify or improve the existing well-established culture.
It's going to be an interesting journey............
