Round 7 - Brumbies v Reds, GIO Stadium, Canberra Sat 8th Apr @ 7:45PM AEST

[Brumby Jack]

Discipline will be key for the Reds vs Brumbies this week.

Reds equal most penalised side (64) in the comp against the least penalised (41)

 

[Simon.]

Bloody hell. With Hunt out, Maranta and JMac in and the only one of the bench with more than a small handful of games being Tui, you've gotta tip Ponies by a lot.

It sounds like Frisby and Ready need to go back to club for a while, but I shudder to think what this whole farce is going to do to the team's morale.

 

[RedsHappy]

Bloody hell. With Hunt out, Maranta and JMac in and the only one of the bench with more than a small handful of games being Tui, you've gotta tip Ponies by a lot.

It sounds like Frisby and Ready need to go back to club for a while, but I shudder to think what this whole farce is going to do to the team's morale.

You make a good point at the end there Simon.

HC Stiles will need to be very careful wrt his strong 'naming and shaming' of individual players MO in this and other cases.

I like his overt, honest frankness and non-PC manner of dealing with 'disappointing results' but there's a fine line between demanding good performance and dropping players who do not deliver and, on the other side of this ledger, tending to solely blame players for poor outcomes vs taking responsibility in a proper manner as HC and this management style leading to buried resentments and demotivation inside the team.

At the end of the day it is the HC's burden and responsibly to own team outcomes; the best HCs typically seek to own them and take undue pressure off the team.

Wessels at the Force was IMO impressive and showed mature leadership character in this regard when often this season he's said things like 'this one's on me' and 'I'm responsible for this' when Force results have not been wins.

 

[Braveheart81]

Interesting. Apparently Frisby and Ready went out on Sat night after the game..

They decided a night on the tiles was better than staying under the bus where Stiles had thrown them?

 

[joeyjohnz]

I disagree Redshappy.

Ready & Frisby have been nothing but wet socks this year. Their on-field efforts have been particularly disappointing when you consider they were on the Cheika express to Europe last November.

I don't think RG called Frisby out for any of his numerous brain explosions for his entire professional career. And boy oh boy, there's been quite a few.

Frisby has the largest ego in the Reds by a country mile. Only Jarryd Hayne would consider him a good bloke. It's about time he was called out for his "me-first" attitude and grounded.

On reflection, can anyone definitively say that Frisby has been improving year-by-year? Or that he's even improved from his first year out? All I'm seeing are poorly executed box kicks and the same brain-explosions that he's been making since 21.

Hopefully they're both ready to eat some humble pie and put in some extra's.

 

[RugbyReg]

I think Stiles has the support of his team. Apparently other senior players were disappointed in Frisby and Ready's actions.


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[Scrubber2050]

^^^^
Shit Joeyjohnz

Did Frsby belt you up at school ?????

 

[joeyjohnz]

Unfortunately, my thoughts on Frisby are entirely based on his performances on the Rugby field along with what I've seen when he's been out on the town in Brisbane at an institution rhyming with every day of the week.

There's a reason he got his nickname.... and yes, it's exactly what you think.

I've seen Pickles Pickle more time then I have fingers, and I've never been in school or played club footy with him...

 

[RedsHappy]

I disagree Redshappy.

Ready & Frisby have been nothing but wet socks this year. Their on-field efforts have been particularly disappointing when you consider they were on the Cheika express to Europe last November.

I don't think RG called Frisby out for any of his numerous brain explosions for his entire professional career. And boy oh boy, there's been quite a few.

Frisby has the largest ego in the Reds by a country mile. Only Jarryd Hayne would consider him a good bloke. It's about time he was called out for his "me-first" attitude and grounded.

On reflection, can anyone definitively say that Frisby has been improving year-by-year? Or that he's even improved from his first year out? All I'm seeing are poorly executed box kicks and the same brain-explosions that he's been making since 21.

Hopefully they're both ready to eat some humble pie and put in some extra's.

All good mate. I was in no way excusing or much diluting any version of what you say re these players. (But do remember that Frisby has obviously been selected and supported by Stiles as HC, until recently, in one of his key Reds playing roles.)

What I did say, I said: the fine line that IMO HCs must walk when players underperform on the field re tearing strips off them in pubic vs dealing with underperformance - in various ways - less publicly.

HC's that get into the habit of consistently, openly blaming their squads when things of wrong.........I would say that often ends in tears for all parties, as the HC concerned ultimately is shown the door in unhappy circumstances.

Time will surely tell as always. Right now Stiles has w-l of 17% after 6 rounds. 1 win only. By any standard - even the notorious 'we're rebuilding and developing' one - that's very poor for a supposedly well-resourced franchise.

He'd better start improving it or all the squad blaming, collectively or individually, will assume the physical characteristics of pure vapour.

 

[No4918]

Calling out a 'knock on' as a sign of poor performance from the bench is quite staggering. Reds made a total of 14 handling errors, all could potentially lead directly to tries. Why is one form a fresh bench player any worse than from a starter in the first 5 minutes?

I can understand the rest of the playing group being disappointed with Ready and Frisby. But as RedsHappy has said, Stiles is walking a fine line here and may have lost two players already. No sooner has he said it takes 23 players to win a game he calls out just 2 guys, not a decision I particularly like.

 

[joeyjohnz]

What I did say, I said: the fine line that IMO HCs must walk when players underperform on the field re tearing strips off them in pubic vs dealing with underperformance - in various ways - less publicly.

HC's that get into the habit of consistently, openly blaming their squads when things of wrong...I would say that often ends in tears for all parties, as the HC concerned ultimately is shown the door in unhappy circumstances.

I couldn't agree more!

I don't think Stiles is the one to get into the habit of blaming squads. His answers in previous press conferences have been extraordinary in the golden age of cliche's!

Wayne Bennett publicly castrated Jordan Kahu in a presser over the weekend.

I don't have any problem with a coach publicly admitting that a player doesn't meet standards.

I agree that habitual blaming isn't the path a HC should follow, but this is the first time Stiles has stepped along this path and I think "rightly so".

 

[joeyjohnz]

Calling out a 'knock on' as a sign of poor performance from the bench is quite staggering. Reds made a total of 14 handling errors, all could potentially lead directly to tries. Why is one form a fresh bench player any worse than from a starter in the first 5 minutes?

I can understand the rest of the playing group being disappointed with Ready and Frisby. But as RedsHappy has said, Stiles is walking a fine line here and may have lost two players already. No sooner has he said it takes 23 players to win a game he calls out just 2 guys, not a decision I particularly like.

I think Stiles called out these two in particular because they're meant to be "senior players". You're put on the field to make a difference and your involvements gift turnovers?
These two blokes were Wallaby tourists 5 months ago!

One would think that after being dropped to to the bench, they'd play the house down!?

It seems like they were more interested in a tipple after the game.

Back to Reds Brumbies, we're well-fucked regardless of who plays. McIntyre is probably our worst player in the professional era, but Maranta may give him a run for his money come Saturday.

 

[The torpedo]

You make a good point at the end there Simon.

HC Stiles will need to be very careful wrt his strong 'naming and shaming' of individual players MO in this and other cases.

I like his overt, honest frankness and non-PC manner of dealing with 'disappointing results' but there's a fine line between demanding good performance and dropping players who do not deliver and, on the other side of this ledger, tending to solely blame players for poor outcomes vs taking responsibility in a proper manner as HC and this management style leading to buried resentments and demotivation inside the team.

At the end of the day it is the HC's burden and responsibly to own team outcomes; the best HCs typically seek to own them and take undue pressure off the team.

Wessels at the Force was IMO impressive and showed mature leadership character in this regard when often this season he's said things like 'this one's on me' and 'I'm responsible for this' when Force results have not been wins.

Agreed on all points RH.

Reg, do you have a transcript/record of all of Stiles's post-match pressers?

 

[Brumby Jack]

Agreed on all points RH.

Reg, do you have a transcript/record of all of Stiles's post-match pressers?

If you look in the Fox Sports video section, they have the Australian based games presser vision. May need to trawl back a bit though.

 

[Sully]

I'm going to reserve my opinion on Maranta untill after I see him play.
Must say I haven't seen anything in Ready's olay that I thought was particularly terrible but had noticed Frisby's passing had been pretty inaccurate.
If, as it seems, Styles has been frustrated by the two guys attitude fir a while maybe publically calling them out is a last resort. Let's hope it works.

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[RugbyReg]

Agreed on all points RH.

Reg, do you have a transcript/record of all of Stiles's post-match pressers?

Sorry mate no. Reds always live stream their post match conferences though so keep an eye for them post game.

No4918 I can't find the video on line but the way the 'calling out' happened was something like this:

Journo: 'the bench were not that great tonight were they?' paraphrasing) "Hendrick Tui dropped the ball, Lukhan Tui dropped the ball"

Stiles "Andrew Ready dropped the ball. Nick Frisby played very poorly". I can't remember the exact pickle quote but it was close enough to that

So that's just a bit of context. He didn't just launch into Frisby and Ready, he was responding to a journo.

I think the jounro followed up along the lines of "what do you do about it?" To which Stiles basically responded "make changes".

The dye was cast then (or is it die?)

 

[TOCC]

Can certainly understand Frisby getting dropped, his performances this year have been woeful and Tuttle is cleary in better form.. I actually think a round of club rugby to let him play back into form..

Ready hasn't been playing that badly, I thought his performance on Sat night was reasonable, from what I've heard getting on the cans on Saturday night is likely more of a factor in his dropping.. both are relatively senior players(wallaby squad incluaions) and they're worried about the standard it sets for the younger players.

 

[gel]

It's difficult to tell what it is that true leaders have that allows them to say some things, whilst others cannot. Is it the body language? The eye contact (or movement)? The tone of voice? Or combinations of them, or something else?

We're all human here (I presume), and have all experienced people that we instantly respect and fall in line behind. And we have all had others in authority that we instantly feel uneasy about and question every decision without really knowing why. We use excuses like experience level and results etc, but these are often independent of the initial unease (and in the latter case can be a direct result of the unease in the first place).

I've read some statements in the papers from Stiles and immediately thought that he shouldn't have said it (the "defining season" statement prior to SA tour for example), but I am cognisant that I didn't see him say it.

When he called out Ready and Frisby I wasn't immediately put off by the statement as I was watching in on YouTube. It was only afterwards that I thought about it a bit more and was a bit uneasy about it, but even then saw no issue until I saw it being raised by others on the board here.

My first exposure to RG as a coach was when he had a presser when he was at the Force and he responded to one of the journos about a player injury with "well, he's a back isn't he" and my brain immediately screamed "well so were you!". He hadn't said anything particularly bad, and he had made a lighthearted comment that I immediately rebelled against. He's going to be a guy that people won't follow.

I wonder, those of you that saw the presser - how did you initially feel when he said it? If you felt nothing other than interest on his perspective then Stiles is probably going to get away with a lot of statements that might seem a bit much.

If you felt immediate unease - he'll lose the room quickly and it will be messy.

 

[RedsHappy]

IMO you're a fine contributor here gel.

But the above ^^^^^^, well that's ***** stars. Thank you.

 

[Brumby Jack]

When he called out Ready and Frisby I wasn't immediately put off by the statement as I was watching in on YouTube. It was only afterwards that I thought about it a bit more and was a bit uneasy about it, but even then saw no issue until I saw it being raised by others on the board here.

He's continued the criticism of Ready and Frisby, amongst other things about this weeks game again today.