Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 12:01 pm  

Obviously at times it's been tough this year but to win 7 out of 8 seems to have turned things around. We've had injuries although personally I don't feel they should have led to some of the poor performances but they obviously didn't help.

He loaned O'Brien which helped us to get going which may have been an obvious decision as we've all wanted a HB but he did it. The kicking game recently has dramatically improved, I noticed that Wilkin has been playing 9 in our own half in recent weeks and I think this was so he could have more space to kick rather than the opposition closing him down as they know who it's going to on tackle 5 which again IMO is good coaching. Also our recent defensive efforts have been very good although the tries yesterday should/could have been avoided.

We've also still got a long way to go, the attack still isn't right although it's improving and Lance at 6 may just be the downfall in getting as far as we can in the playoffs &the discipline is still an issue, gave away 9 penalties yesterday in comparison to Wakefield giving us 3 but overall we've made massive improvements.

So what does everyone think so far? there's obviously other positives and negatives from this year but i've just chosen those ones as ones that stand out. There was a thread on here awhile back and he wasn't going down too well so just interested to see if people are coming around to him?

I'd say he's doing fine, no better, no worse.

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 12:13 pm  

I think he is a good coach. He can spot a player. So as a recruiter, hopefully he will improve us.

I think he will also develop our young players to that level that some coaches have not to be successful long term in SL.

He does like to experiment, which I think is his one downfall.

I am not anti-experimentation. But I struggle to see why some of this could not have been done in the off-season. Especially if he was going to get rid of Gaskell and realised Lance was useless, we could have moved earlier in the year to secure a half.

In the end I think it was a mistake not to bring him in when he left Huddersfield.
Had we done that, he could have sifted out some of the issues last year.

I'd give him a 7 out of 10. I'm not against experimentation, but it seemed to go on for a lot longer than is reasonable. As a team the league may mean nothing, as a set of fans and a club the league is the largest proportion of games and the clubs biggest source of income. Fans will not want to come and watch trial games.

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 12:31 pm  

I am unconvinced with him.

Sure we have finally gained some form, but why weren't we playing like this earlier in the season with basically the same team?
Is it down to brown. We got quite far with rush in charge last year and he isn't even a SL coach, so maybe its down to the players just find their collective mojo?

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 12:57 pm  

saint at wire wrote:

I am unconvinced with him.

Sure we have finally gained some form, but why weren't we playing like this earlier in the season with basically the same team?
Is it down to brown. We got quite far with rush in charge last year and he isn't even a SL coach, so maybe its down to the players just find their collective mojo?

I know what you mean it is hard to understand but we did have players missing so it's harsh to say it's the same team. We did get far with Rush but the rugby was extremely boring and the change of style we've had this year also led to the poor start as well . Few posters on here who are in the know all say the players love Brown and when he started I heard they couldn't believe how much detail etc he had gone into during the preseason as to why we hadn't won any trophies in recent years.

I think they've bought into what he was trying to do with the mix and matching of teams and we've started playing the same team week in week out now. I think we've planned to go all out towards the back end (although I still think we're looking at SFs at an absolute push) but I think the injuries left us in a worse place than we had hoped.

All opinion of course but this is why I wanted to see what everyone was thinking!

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 1:03 pm  

JamesSL wrote:

I know what you mean it is hard to understand but we did have players missing so it's harsh to say it's the same team. We did get far with Rush but the rugby was extremely boring and the change of style we've had this year also led to the poor start as well . Few posters on here who are in the know all say the players love Brown and when he started I heard they couldn't believe how much detail etc he had gone into during the preseason as to why we hadn't won any trophies in recent years.

I think they've bought into what he was trying to do with the mix and matching of teams and we've started playing the same team week in week out now. I think we've planned to go all out towards the back end (although I still think we're looking at SFs at an absolute push) but I think the injuries left us in a worse place than we had hoped.

All opinion of course but this is why I wanted to see what everyone was thinking!

I think that's probably a fair comment.

He'll have taken lessons from Huddersfield burning out at the end of the campaign, but the issues with our starting half back combination, the injuries to Roby and some senior members of our pack being less than useless (Hello Josh! ) have culminated in us being worse than anticipated for most of the season.

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 1:45 pm  

Billinge_Lump wrote:

the issues with our starting half back combination, the injuries to Roby and some senior members of our pack being less than useless (Hello Josh! ) have culminated in us being worse than anticipated for most of the season.

Agreed, as bewareshadows has said above we should have got him in as soon as he left Huddersfield. I think this year was very much a case of Brown not realising how bad things had become in recent years until he got in although as I said earlier, he had identified a list of reasons as to why we hadn't won anything. I think there was just more problems than expected...perhaps he should have spoken with Saddened!

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 3:34 pm  

The main issue for me with him is that I stuck with him for the majority of the season and defended him and his actions.
However Saints performances got to a point where I could no longer do so - I had lost faith with him as a coach and it took a lot for that to happen - now it will take a huge effort on his part to get me on side with him and his actions - the last 7 wins have gone part way but he will need to get this team really performing over the next (up to) 7 games without any unneccesary fiddling with positions or game plans.
I want to see us play well - not just win.

I am sure he will lose sleep over this

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 4:25 pm  

Brown implemented a totally new style of play, the players took time to adapt to it and change how they play and whilst they did we was seeing poor performances.

Now they've adapted we're seeing better performances. Brown is probably the best coach we could have got and I'm certain we will win a trophy under his tenure. His attention to detail in tactics is obsessive, his training methods evolve with the game as good coaches do and he has a great eye to spot players strength and weaknesses. He's very good in the transfer market as seen by Manu, Turner and Walmsley.

I think he is an excellent coach.

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 4:55 pm  

BackrowSaint wrote:

Brown implemented a totally new style of play, the players took time to adapt to it and change how they play and whilst they did we was seeing poor performances.

Now they've adapted we're seeing better performances. Brown is probably the best coach we could have got and I'm certain we will win a trophy under his tenure. His attention to detail in tactics is obsessive, his training methods evolve with the game as good coaches do and he has a great eye to spot players strength and weaknesses. He's very good in the transfer market as seen by Manu, Turner and Walmsley.

I think he is an excellent coach.

I agree 100%.

There has been a period of adaption and that has been elongated because of the injuries and the disruption. When we have HBs next season (fingers crossed) I think we will do much better.

Re: Nathan Brown - What do we think? : Mon Aug 19, 2013 4:57 pm  

Albion wrote:

There has been a period of adaption and that has been elongated because of the injuries and the disruption.

Pretty much sums it up I think, next year on paper is looking good although have to be cautious as this year did as well....