Why Wayne Bennett decided to leave the Broncos

INSIDE STORY: Wayne Bennett knew the Broncos were going to get rid of him, and he didn't want to give them that satisfaction.

WAYNE Bennett knew the Broncos were going to get rid of him. He didn't want to give them that satisfaction.

A deteriorating relationship with the Broncos board had reached the point where Bennett decided to jump before being pushed when his contract expired at the end of next year.

It was the ultimate power play from a man who for 21 years had been the coach and all-encompassing figure at the game's most dominant club.

The day's most revealing quote came when Bennett said "I didn't want them to pull a Sheedy on me" in reference to Essendon's dramatic sacking of veteran coach Kevin Sheedy last year.

Bennett's departure was the talk of Queensland yesterday. Brisbane Broncos fans have never known another coach and such is his status that on the same day his resignation sent shock waves throughout the state his name was brought up during court proceedings involving a former member of Parliament and a coal mine millionaire.

Bennett will complete his 21st year at the club this season but is unlikely to be lost to the NRL with the Bulldogs and Dragons among his likely suitors.

This was the day that has been coming since mid-2006 when it was revealed that he had secretly brokered a deal to coach the Roosters.

Believing his position was under threat at the Broncos, Bennett made moves to secure his financial future. Despite a large property portfolio, including a farm at Warwick and an apartment on the Sunshine Coast, his great fear in life has always been passing away without having enough money to guarantee life-long support for his two disabled children, Katherine and Justin.

"It preyed on Wayne's mind," one Broncos official said yesterday. "It was one of those situations where he never felt enough would be enough given inflation levels and the cost of specialist treatment. Unfortunately Wayne's relationship with the board was never the same again."

The Roosters deal in 2006 hinged on it being kept secret and collapsed when word leaked out to the media. Incredibly, the Broncos were the last to know. And they never forgave him.

Broncos chief executive Bruno Cullen, a straight-shooter not normally given to whimsy, initially joked how the rumours had come "from thin air" and mocked the story.

He started to get worried but consoled himself with the thought "surely if there's something happening Wayne would approach me".

Then finally he decided enough was enough. He phoned Bennett and the coach said "we better have a chat", which is where Bennett revealed the plan.

The long-term relationship between Cullen and Bennett was not reduced to poisonous levels, but it was never the same.

"The bottom line to all this is that Wayne thought he could control Bruno when he was chief executive and get his way like he always used to," one club source said yesterday.

"But Bruno surprised him. It was a case of two stubborn old hard heads clashing and neither prepared to give way."

The Roosters deal or no deal was the defining moment in the club's history when the Broncos stopped being Wayne Bennett's club, when other people in the club were more important than the man who had coached it for all its life.

Broncos board meetings of that time reportedly featured angry words from members who contemptuously declared enough was enough. The same men who had worshipped at Bennett's altar only months before were privately questioning his future.

Anti-Bennett feelings intensified on October 5 when Bennett accepted a life membership at the Broncos presentation night but the only word he said on stage was "thanks" to Cullen when he shook his hand.

The next morning there was an informal phone round of several board members and word leaked to the media they thought Bennett's actions were "embarrassing, disgusting and disgraceful", with one official claiming "how can you expect the players to show respect to people when they get a lead like that from the coach?"

Bennett defended himself by claiming it was a long night – and the players' night – but talk centred firmly on the coach and his increasingly fragile relationship with the board.

The bond between Bennett and Cullen received another black eye when news leaked out on December 9 that Bennett was receiving six-figure payments annually from controversial mining magnate Ken Talbot to help support his disabled children.

Cullen was angry when told that Bennett had revealed to the media that Cullen was aware of the deal.

The next day Bennett tendered his resignation but the board requested a cooling-off period, believing Bennett had simply over-reacted to media pressure.

The Broncos are owned by News Limited (publishers of The Courier-Mail) whose chairman and chief executive John Hartigan last night revealed he had spoken to Bennett in Sydney on Saturday.

"I had read he was going to make a decision so I wanted to put in front of him what News' position was," Hartigan said last night. "That was one of great support. He was a creative genius with the players. We recognise that. In an ideal world I would have liked to see him see out his contract but we won't stand in his way. I left the meeting thinking he would resign."

Bennett's obsession about doing the best for his children reached all avenues of his life.

It spurs him to eat well and to exercise to a point where he can beat some of his players in road runs at the age of 58.

Bennett generally kept his concern over his family to himself but in a recent interview on the ABC he dissolved into tears when discussing his plans to support them beyond his own life.

Through his massively successful two-decade stay at the Broncos, Bennett has always been defiantly his own man. But he has also kept an open ear to those he trusted most.

It was widely thought the death of his cherished mentor Bob Bax and colourful club director Paul Morgan rocked Bennett's equilibrium because they were two people who never feared him and were often brave enough to privately challenge him and thereby help him make balanced decisions.

Bax, a colourful former starting price bookie, story-teller and bush psychologist, was everything the non-drinking, non-gambling Bennett wasn't. But they clicked.

Bennett and Bax were so close that Bax would have no hesitation in saying to Bennett "I can't believe you are still picking that bloke".

No offence would be taken.

The gregarious Morgan was even more forceful and would occasionally ring Bennett after a big lunch demanding "when are these blokes going to stop playing like a pack of sheilas?"

Few would ever consider being as game.

Many players privately admitted they were intimidated by Bennett's presence in a headmaster-student sort of way.

One Courier-Mail journalist who gave Allan Langer a lift back from a guest-speaking lunch in Caloundra was stunned by how fearful he was about missing the start of training by a few minutes.

"Mate, we just have to be on time . . . otherwise I am dead," Langer said.

Bennett had a tempestuous relationship with Brisbane's football media and did not speak to The Courier-Mail's chief rugby league writer Steve Ricketts for almost three years after taking strong objection to this paper's coverage of Justin Hodges' decision to join the Sydney Roosters in 2002.

The two have now mended their differences.

The Courier-Mail online surveys yesterday started with a flood of support for Bennett, then swung around with a collective cheer for the fact that he was gone. Then came some strident demands from readers demanding Cullen be sacked.

None of this will surprise anyone who knows Bennett or has even followed his career.

Bennett polarises people. People are barely ever indifferent to him.