Anthony Seibold takes aim at club veterans as stats show Broncos inferiority

The fallout after Brisbane’s capitulation to the Eels has continued, with coach Anthony Seibold taking aim at a select group of players who the stats show aren’t up to first grade standards.

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Broncos coach Anthony Seibold has turned the blowtorch on his leadership group in a stinging address that threatens to rip the heart out of the senior core and spark a Red Hill revolution.

Cultural change is coming ahead of today’s board meeting with internal data showing just 50 per cent of Broncos players are meeting the performance benchmarks Seibold believes are required to be a premiership contender.

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Alarmingly, a woeful 15 per cent of the squad were able to meet Seibold’s specific high-performance standards when the coach first arrived at the Broncos in December.

Brisbane Broncos coach Anthony Seibold’s standards aren’t being met. Picture: AAP Image/Dan Peled

The internal testing not only involves data from GPS tracking, but strength-and-conditioning programs and statistics taken from the individual output of Broncos players during the 2019 season.

Put simply, the Broncos are mentally and athletically inferior to NRL powerhouses Melbourne and the Roosters, prompting Seibold to deliver some withering home truths to Brisbane’s senior group on Wednesday.

The Courier-Mail understands Seibold didn’t pull punches with Origin, Test and grand final servants Alex Glenn, Anthony Milford, Matt Gillett, Corey Oates, Andrew McCullough, Joe Ofahengaue and skipper Darius Boyd.

The player review was pencilled into Brisbane’s season schedule before last Sunday’s 58-0 debacle against the Eels.

Matt Gillett is in the gun despite returning from a neck injury. Picture: Annette Dew

What wasn’t initially planned was the ferocity of Seibold’s message and the cultural improvements the coach believes are necessary to give Brisbane a harder edge to break the club’s 13-year premiership drought.

The group were told that, instead of setting a performance tone for Brisbane’s rookies, they were being shown up by the likes of young guns Payne Haas, Jake Turpin, Pat Carrigan and Kotoni Staggs.

Corey Oates has been told he needs to lift. Picture: Annette Dew

Gillett has escaped many of the brickbats that have been thrown at Boyd, Milford and McCullough but Broncos powerbrokers were far from enthused with his contribution this season.

While allowances were made because Gillett was returning from a serious neck injury, Brisbane chiefs want to see more overt signs of off-field leadership from the Queensland Origin back-rower.

The Broncos need Oates, who turns 25 next month, to display more maturity and Ofahengaue to step-up now that he is an Origin forward.

Brisbane’s playing-roster dynamic is precariously balanced. There is an internal sentiment that Brisbane’s senior core have become too complacent, with $1 million man Milford the prime poster boy.

If the leadership group don’t drive greater standards of accountability and performance, Seibold has the support of the Broncos board to wield the axe with a perform-or-perish mantra.

The 2020 pre-season will be a brutal and career-defining period for Brisbane’s highest-paid players. Seibold’s praise of his rookies in the wake of the 58-0 loss to the Eels was evidence of the coach’s mindset.

“If there is something that gives me hope, it’s that we have good young men who are at the beginning of their careers, who want to train hard and don’t toss up excuses,” he said.

“Everyone can see our deficiencies. Kick pressure is a choice. ‘Escorting’ (kick protection) for a teammate is choice. Moving when the ball goes away from you is a choice. The players are making a choice for someone else to do it.

“It will be a long off-season and long pre-season. We don’t play again until next March.

“I want winners. I want people who want to work hard and win.

“We are a million miles away from where I want to take us.”