Hull KR’s Easter Monday clash with Toulouse Olympique in France will be Tony Smith’s 500th Super League game as a Head Coach.
Ahead of a landmark game, and a first for Smith as he takes on Toulouse in Super League for the first time just days after a Hull derby, he has reflected on his 20-year coaching career in Super League and the highs and lows of his time as a coach.
“I never imagined that I would reach this amount of games,” Smith said, “I wanted to be a coach and I’m honoured to be a coach as long as I have.
“I’ve been lucky enough to be involved in some big matches, I’ve been on the end of some big hidings. I’ve got a lot of memories. I’ve been in it to try and improve the sport, young men’s dreams and help them achieve them and improve their game and as people along the way both as players and coaches. I was nurtured as a young coach and I try to do similar.
“That’s been an important part of me being a coach is helping others by learning from some of those mistakes I’ve made through the years and some of the successes I’ve had as well.
“I enjoy what I do on a weekly and daily basis. I enjoy being part of that culture and helping improve that culture and at each club I’ve been at the culture has been strong enough and good enough to achieve some things along the way.
“I love going to work, the camaraderie of it and what we get to do at work.”
As arguably Super League’s greatest ever coach, Smith has coached in six Grand Finals and five cup finals, and explained what those big occasions feel like as a coach: “I’m very lucky to have some memories of some big matches, but in some of those big matches when things turn out the way you wanted them to you’re relieved. On the flip side when you’re not so successful on that day you think about what you could have done better.
“The week preceding the big day are real tough on coaches. There’s some bad news you’ve got to deliver to some players you care a whole lot for and some of them have been really tough decisions over the years and I know I’ve not gotten them all right.
“To leave someone out who has a childhood dream of playing in a Grand Final and you tell them that they’ve missed out you do it with a heavy heart. I’d rather have that problem than not have that problem but it has those downsides.”
Smith famously left Matt Adamson out of the 2004 Grand Final which was said to devastate the second-row who as a Manchester United fan was desperate to play at Old Trafford. Oddly that was the only time that season Smith named the same team two weeks in a row and is an example of the type of big decisions he has been forced to make.
Smith has had to make those decisions at plenty of clubs turning the likes of Leeds and Warrington into contenders after years of hurt and he hopes he’s improved every club he’s been with: “I’d like to think the culture has always been better and healthier from when I’ve started to when I’ve left.
“By the time I left Warrington we had a pretty lean season, you don’t change your coach until you have a lean season and that was my ninth season with them and we dipped below our standards that year. One of the years I was at Leeds 2006 wasn’t as strong as 04 and 05 but I’d like to think I was part of the culture that developed here [Leeds] which lasted for a number of years.
“When I took over Warrington they weren’t part of the big four but even now they’re part of, if you like, a big four and are spoken about in a different light. We changed our own attitude towards ourselves but also other people’s attitudes towards us and I like to think I’ve had that influence at Huddersfield too. I like to think I had some influence in what happened to them, I’m not trying to take credit but I like to thing I attributed to their culture.
“I think it’s happening again at Hull KR. It’s not easy and it’s not quick particularly things that last for a while. It takes time to instil culture and beliefs. Teams are now a bit warry of us, once upon a time we were seen as ‘oh it’s Hull KR this week, that’s two points’ and some of that’s changing. It’s not where we want it to be yet but we’re in the process of changing it.”
He also spoke about how long he’s likely to keep coaching after his 500th game: “Whilst ever I’m useful to the players [I’ll keep coaching]. Players decided whether I’m a good coach or not. Whilst ever I’m useful, and I’ll sense when I’m not. The last couple of years have been really enjoyable and it’s made me realise how much I like coaching.
“It’s coaching that I love. When you love something you’re better at it and I’ll only do it while I love it.”
