NRL 2020: Brisbane Broncos at odds over coach Anthony Seibold’s contract
Paul White and Anthony Seibold are at odds over the embattled coach’s five-year contract, with the Broncos CEO going against the coach’s recent comments.
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The Broncos have been plunged into high-level confusion with Brisbane chief executive Paul White and Anthony Seibold at odds over the structure of the coach’s contract.
Seibold last week denied his five-year contract at the Broncos is laced with performance benchmarks as he hit back at suggestions Brisbane hierarchy had the power to terminate him earlier if he is not meeting expectations.
But White has since contradicted the views of Seibold, confirming the embattled Broncos coach indeed had performance clauses inserted into his $3 million-plus deal, which was brokered in 2018 when he replaced Wayne Bennett.
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It is not clear whether there is a specific get-out clause related to dismissing Seibold if the Broncos miss the finals this season, but White revealed the Brisbane’s coach five-year arrangement is not without some incentives.
Asked if was “bad business” not to insert a get-out clause to protect the Broncos during the course of a five-year deal, White spoke candidly about Seibold’s contract.
“There’s performance measures in every contract,” White told Channel 9’s 100% Footy program.
“To say that’s there no performance measures in Anthony’s contract is certainly not true.”
White’s revelation flies in the face of comments from Seibold, who dismissed concerns about job safety in the lead-up to Brisbane’s 26-16 loss to the Warriors last Saturday night.
Seibold insisted his five-year deal was free of any performance requirements.
“Well, I don’t look two or three weeks down the track in terms of job safety,” Seibold said.
“If at some stage, the Broncos don’t think I’m the right person for the job, then that’s their decision.
“I have a really strong contract there, it’s not performance-based.
“But at the end of the day, I’ll know if I’m not the right person for the job. I won’t need anyone else to tap me on the shoulder.”
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It has been widely reported that Seibold has a five-year deal with an option in his favour for a sixth year, but White clarified the term as he vowed to stand by the 2018 Dally M coach of the year.
“It’s a five-year deal,” White said.
“The reason we went with a long-term deal, you say Anthony was a rookie coach but he had been in a number of systems, he had a good first year at Souths and they wanted to retain him, so there was some market competition there to bring him to our club.
“They wanted to retain him on a longer-term deal.
“If you pick a coach and you want to stick you have to be able to give them time to reshape the systems and the squad and the way things are done. That does take some time.
“Our job at the moment is to support our coach, it’s been a tough six weeks and an extraordinary set of circumstances leading into this season.
“One thing I know about Anthony is that he has great work ethic, he does listen, he will take advice and he will reflect on the last few weeks and he will make changes.”