Mal Meninga outlines his plan for the Titans while assuring coach Garth Brennan he won’t interfere
Mal Meninga is determined to turn around the Titans. But he says he is not at the club to overrule coach Garth Brennan and wants to tap into the Gold Coast’s rugby league history.
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Immortal Mal Meninga has delivered his first piece of work to Gold Coast Titans and declared he would not be overruling coach Garth Brennan.
The Sunday Mail can reveal Meninga presented the dossier to Titans management, highlighting his take on the club and where it needs to improve.
“Mal’s Manifesto” included the history of rugby league on the Gold Coast, an analysis of the Titans’ structure and how performance can lift.
The Kangaroos coach was last year inducted into the exclusive Immortals and won nine Origin series at the helm of Queensland.
The Titans pulled off a coup in signing Meninga as the club’s head of performance and culture late last year in a bid to transform the struggling franchise into a premiership contender.
Meninga, who relocated to the Gold Coast from Canberra last week, said the Titans had the potential to become a powerhouse club.
“I learnt there is a lot of honesty at the club,” Meninga told The Sunday Mail.
“With that you can improve the organisation and hopefully improve it quickly.
“Everyone understands where they sit as far as success goes. The headspace is in the right area. They all care about the organisation and have a great work ethic.
“We’ve got to work on a common purpose and set of beliefs that is going to be the foundation for the club going forward. Everyone in the organisation has had an input into that.”
After commuting from Canberra for two months, Meninga and his young family have moved permanently to the Gold Coast.
Now settled, Meninga is branching further into the Gold Coast’s football operations and will work more with Brennan.
The Titans finished 14th last season in Brennan’s first year at the club and have only played finals football once (2016) in the past eight seasons.
Despite having serious clout, Meninga insisted he was not at the club to overrule Brennan.
“I just want to help,” Meninga said.
“That’s my simple mantra. I want to help them to be better at everything they do. That’s what my job is.
“Everyone can improve collectively.
“We’ve got to have a mindset about wanting to improve every day. That’s part of our purpose.
“If we want to have sustained success like the top clubs in this competition there are certain things we need to do on a regular basis.
“The coaching staff are doing some really good work here under Garth’s leadership.
“I’m here to help, not take over.”
Meninga helped build a Maroons dynasty by focusing as much on what happens away from the field as on it.
He instigated the RISE – Respect, Inspire, Selflessness, Excellence – mantra with the Kangaroos and is working on delivering the Titans their own set of values.
“Every organisation has a purpose and set of beliefs that is them,” he said.
“That’s the way they operate and how they make decisions.
“I believe the things you do outside your work days are just as important as what you do through your work days.
“Everything you do beyond training and club commitments … what you do at home and how you lead your life is a really important part of your preparation to get it right on game day.
“I’m looking forward to getting to know all the players and hopefully having a positive impact on their lives and footy lives.
“They’re setting standards that will hold them in good stead when times get tough in games.”
The appointment of Meninga would not have happened without the approval from club owners the Frizelle and Kelly families.
Darryl Kelly said Meninga had delivered an honest assessment of the Titans and it was clear standards had to lift at the club, on and off the field.
“We’ve always known the club has not performed at the highest level,” Kelly said.
“The idea behind appointing Mal was to lift the expectations within the whole business, not only the playing group.
“We’re happy with what he’s done so far. We have to not only put it down on paper but also deliver it in reality. It’s about lifting expectations.
“People perform to a level in business and on the field to what they see as being acceptable.
“What was acceptable in the past is not acceptable anymore.
“The standards have got to be lifted. Everybody (other clubs) is in the same position at the moment. We all think we’ve had good pre-seasons and are better than we were last year.
“But someone is going to come first and someone is going to come last.
“Our squad is talented, there’s no doubt about that, they’ve now got to play to their potential.”
Professional rugby league has had a turbulent history on the Gold Coast.
The Titans are the fifth incarnation of a league franchise on the Coast in the past 30 years following the demise of the Giants, Seagulls, Gladiators and Chargers.
While the Titans have only been around since 2007, and suffered a dramatic dip in supporters since their successful early years, Meninga said that the club had to tap into the region’s rugby league history.
“The Gold Coast rugby league community has had a lot of success since it started in the early 1900s,” he said.
“There is a rich history and a lot of success during that time.
“This is a new organisation with new ownership and new ways of doing things.
“It’s only 12 months old. Everyone is looking forward to improving.”
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