Jarryd Hayne v Neil Henry: Now is time for Titans to show they stand for something

ROBERT CRADDOCK: If the Gold Coast Titans sack Neil Henry and let Jarryd Hayne stay they will officially become a club that stands for nothing.

The whole vibe of the Titans has changed since Jarryd Hayne got there.

IF THE Gold Coast Titans sack Neil Henry and let Jarryd Hayne stay they will officially become a club that stands for nothing.

If they both go at the end of the season — and that’s a decent chance — then so be it.

But if Henry goes and Hayne wins the war before shooting through to another exotic location at the end of next season you might as well shut the doors.

If you let a flighty superstar dictate team culture then, sorry folks, it’s all over.

There is no culture.

No future. No hope.

If you disagree with this, try calling the seven (mostly exasperated) senior coaches Parramatta had in seven years when Hayne was their star player. They have had just one in three years since he left.

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Neil Henry and Jarryd Hayne. File photo

It’s a tricky situation for the Gold Coast board because it’s a lot easier to sack a coach on around $350,000 than it is to move on a player guaranteed $1.2 million for next season.

But you can’t have a senior player fragmenting the club.

It’s not all Hayne’s fault that the Titans have had three bad losses in a row but what is beyond dispute is that the whole vibe of the joint has changed since he got there.

It was always a dangerously odd fit — the team of hard-nosed scrappers who played for each other aligned to the millionaire butterfly floating through town on a journey to everywhere and nowhere.

At the start of last season the Titans were just about the shortest-priced wooden spoon favourites ever yet scratched and kicked and clawed their way into the finals in a performance that was as bold as you could get.

In even earlier times with the likes of Mark Minichiello, Luke Bailey and Anthony Laffranchi providing the grit and grunt, the Titans once radiated a bare-knuckled unpretentiousness that was easy to like and hard to beat.

The whole vibe of the Titans has changed since Jarryd Hayne got there.

That resolve, which flared again so impressively last season, has suddenly melted.

This is not to say Henry does not have lessons to learn.

People who know him far better than I do say his inflexible bearing of the schoolteacher he used to be can be a drawback.

One of Wayne Bennett’s great skills over the years has been to somehow conjure the best out of players whose talents need nurturing that might not come from the textbook.

Hayne is not a great trainer.

Neither was Steve Renouf.

Jarryd Hayne in action for the Titans.

Broncos players still talk about naming an area the Steve Renouf Hill where the great speedster would occasionally be seen sitting during marathon training drills. But Bennett somehow made it work.

Collingwood have not been the same since Mick Malthouse left as coach and a whole group of quirky talents were either pushed out or retired.

They were a rough and ready group but somehow Malthouse squeezed a premiership out of them with the key being that, for all their foibles, he got them to put the team first. It sounds simple.

Sometimes it can be harder to do than catching a butterfly with your bare hands.