Brisbane Broncos crisis: Club’s ‘Big Three’ must stand down effective immediately
The chairman of the Broncos’ Old Boys says it’s time to cut the head off the snake with a complete clean-out of the club - but it must start with Brisbane’s “Big Three”.
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Broncos legend Chris Johns has called for a complete clean-out, claiming the club’s Big Three — coach Anthony Seibold, chairman Karl Morris and CEO Paul White — must depart to allow Brisbane to begin rebuilding.
Johns, chairman of the Broncos’ Old Boys, implored Seibold, Morris and White to walk away to allow Brisbane a runway to install a fresh front-office ahead of a fightback next season under a new regime.
The off-contract White plans to leave at season’s end, but Johns believes the Broncos boss should leave immediately, with Morris and Seibold in tow, in the wake of Friday night’s 48-0 drubbing against the Tigers.
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“Everything has to be axed at the Broncos. Sack all the key decision-makers,” Johns said.
“This is not a shock to me. The club has lacked leadership for years and now these results are crystallising it.
“The Broncos need to start planning for next year right now.
“This season is gone, it’s done. We can’t make the finals.
“They need to get the foundations fixed now. If you try and build a mansion on poor foundations, the whole thing will collapse.
“The foundation in the NRL starts with the chairman and the CEO. Move aside, get a new board, get a new CEO, a new recruitment bloke and then you can start building the house again.”
Brisbane’s latest capitulation against the Tigers left them floundering in 14th place at the mid-point of the 2020 season, and fans have lashed the club in a poll for The Courier-Mail — with 95 per cent of more than 4000 voters saying this is the worst Broncos side in the club’s history.
Since taking charge of the Broncos last year, Seibold has won 14 of 35 games for a success rate of 40 per cent, well shy of the 64 per cent record his predecessor Wayne Bennett boasted when he was sacked at the end of 2018.
Johns is adamant Queensland Origin coach and Broncos legend Kevin Walters can save the club, lashing the squad’s attitude under Seibold.
“That performance (against the Tigers) was shocking. They are clueless,” he said.
“To lose 48-0 to the Wests Tigers in the wet, the whole club is broken, fix things at the top and then you will see regeneration.
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“Every time something goes wrong, Seibold throws up an excuse. He whinges about injuries. Did you hear Canberra whinge the other night when they had seven guys out and they beat the Roosters without Josh Hodgson?
“The bosses are all sitting around wondering who the problem is when they are the problem.
“Stop putting band-aids on the place. If Paul White sacks Seibold, that’s the fourth coach after Ivan Henjak, Anthony Griffin and Wayne Bennett.
“When is it time to say it’s not just the coach’s problem, it’s the entire organisation?
“The whole front-office and the coach should be sacked. Clean the whole place out and start again.
“Everything will be a band-aid measure until they clean the entire joint out.
“The Broncos players should go into a private camp for the rest of the season to get their act together. They should go without kids and partners, dig in for 10 weeks and have a crack.”
Veteran Broncos centre Darius Boyd admits the squad is struggling for solutions.
“It was disappointing, it’s unacceptable, it’s not good enough,” he told Fox Sports.
“It’s hard being out there as a player and tossing up some of the performances that we are, myself included.
“Sometimes we feel lost on where to go next.
“You can cop a loss, but when you lose by 30-plus points consistently then you really need to look at some changes and I don’t know what that is.”