Castleford Tigers are on the look out for a new coach.
This comes as they made the bold decision to part company with Lee Radford earlier this week after three defeats from three including his worst ever loss as Tigers boss on Friday against Wigan Warriors as they lost 36-0.
This leaves the Tigers with a big decision to make to find a replacement though Andy Last is in the position on a temporary basis at present.
Now a former Castleford player, someone who played under Radford last season, James Clare has had his say on who should replace Radford and gave a very interesting assessment.
“As long as there’s a British coach appointed at Cas then that’ll make me feel a lot better anyway. Ideally I’d want an ex-Cas player. I think at the moment, including Radders, there’s not a single Castleford player on the coaching staff,” Clare told Serious About Rugby League.
“Radford was Hull FC, Lasty was a Hull FC man, even Danny Wilson the Director of Rugby I think he was Head of Youth at Hull KR or something. Scott Murrell wasn’t a known Cas player, Rob Nickolay who is Head of Youth was involved at the Hull academy. There’s no Cas presence holding the foundations together. It’s only a small town so I’d like to see a Castleford appointment.”
Clare says this home town connection wouldn’t necessarily need to be the Head Coach:
“I don’t think they need to be a head coach but just to be involved in the coaching staff, you look at Wigan now with Sean O’Loughlin or Cas when Powelly was there he had Danny Orr. Even at Leeds you had Kev Sinfield involved. You’ve got to have someone who has been through it and knows what it means to the club and the town.
“There’s a lot of things like that go unnoticed. Say you’re playing Wakey, you need someone there who can tell you about the last time they were there and what it means to play them in a derby game and stuff like that. As a player that gets built up throughout the week so to have someone using their own experience is a massive tick in the box.
“If you’re a typical fan at a derby you’re talking about it all week or looking at it two weeks before it happens. You’ll plan your night out, already got banter with your mates and there’s a build up to it. As a player you’ve got to play the game and not even think about the next game. You can’t be thinking about playing Wakey in four weeks when you’ve got to play Wigan, you can’t think about the derby that far ahead like a fan does. When you’ve only got a short time to set yourself up for it.”
