Titans mess will take seasons to fix after Neil Henry, Jarryd Hayne dramas

CHOOSING the next Titans coach will be even more challenging than sacking Neil Henry, writes ROBERT CRADDOCK.

Jarryd Hayne arrives at Titans Headquarters at Parkwood on the Gold Coast.

THE Gold Coast Titans have taken savage action to rescue their club but the wounds will be deep and the pain long lasting.

The certain departure of Neil Henry and the pending exit of Jarryd Hayne may purge the club of the cancerous backbiting that has undermined its season but the road back is a Mt Everest climb.

Choosing the next coach will be even more challenging than sacking the man in the job.

Kevin Walters does not want it. Craig Bellamy seems out of reach. Terry Matterson has been working with Neil Henry so we assume any great ideas he has are already on the table.

There is no boy wonder in the coaching ranks and no out-of-work sage.

Whoever it is will be a gamble and there is no guarantee they will be better than Henry.

Neil Henry is set to coach his last game for the Titans.

It’s fine saying Henry was sacked partially because of fears the club might lose boom boy Ash Taylor if Henry stayed but they might lose Taylor anyway if they sign an unproven coach.

Showing Hayne the door is a far more complex process because unlike Henry, whose $400,000 salary simply has to be paid out and that is the end of the matter, Hayne’s wage comes under the salary cap.

So the process of Hayne’s exit is a bit like paying top dollar for a luxury car and having to unload it after engine problems.

You get what you can for it, suck up the pain and swear next time you’ll get a cheaper more reliable model.

With a diminished reputation that comes with his poor on-field input and role in the club’s civil war, Hayne’s market value has slumped from $1.2 million a year to perhaps a third of that.

The Titans may have to pay him more than $500,000 a year to leave the club and play against them. That hurts.

He is damaged good now. The stats are damning.

In his seven years at Parramatta the Eels had seven coaches.

Now his war with Henry has played a significant role in Henry losing his job.

What coach would say to his committee “you must sign Hayne’’ in the knowledge that they could find him uncoachable?

The Parramatta dramas and the Henry debacle may not be all his fault but he was a lightning rod for the dramas.

LISTEN! The Monday Bunker panel debate the Jarryd Hayne saga, the Bulldogs’ salary cap drama and the intrigue surrounding the top eight.

Rugby league does not handle players with large egos well because it is a sport with relatively few of them given the substantial amounts of money some players earn.

Hayne is such an unusual character that one theory had it that the way to really teach him a lesson would be not to sack him but to make him stay.

Order him to play Intrust Super Cup if necessary, tough out next season, fit into team plans and to help clean up the mess he created.

But that’s the problem in modern sport. The escape hatch is always half open for Hayne as it was in American football and with Fijian rugby.

The butterfly is taking flight again to a destination unknown leaving behind a mess that will take many seasons to fix.