The six areas Brisbane Broncos coach Michael Maguire must address

The Brisbane Broncos are in free fall and coach Michael Maguire is under siege, but they can turn things around and salvage 2025 by addressing these six areas, writes TRAVIS MEYN.

The Brisbane Broncos are seemingly in free fall following six losses in seven games that has thrust the spotlight on coach Michael Maguire and Red Hill.

Maguire is under mounting pressure to turn things around after replacing club legend Kevin Walters at the helm of the Broncos last year.

With Brisbane sitting 11th on the NRL ladder, Maguire has been buffeted by reports of player unrest, fatigue and friction leading into Saturday’s M1 derby against the last-placed Gold Coast Titans at Suncorp Stadium.

Are things really that bad in Brisbane or can Maguire salvage something from the 2025 NRL Premiership?

I’m willing to give the Broncos one more chance ahead of a showdown with wooden spoon favourites the Titans. Brisbane can kickstart a season revival with a win and start to find some confidence and cohesion to build on.

But they can’t ignore the issues and here is my six-point plan to fix the Broncos.

1. COACHING

To suggest Maguire is facing the sack is ridiculous. He has been at Red Hill for all of eight months and coached 12 NRL games.

You have to remember what he walked into. Days after getting the job following Walters’ sacking, Maguire was confronted with the Ezra Mam drug driving scandal.

That type of behaviour was indicative of the problems festering at the Broncos which contributed to Walters’ dismissal.

Broncos coach Michael Maguire is under pressure. Picture: NRL Photos

You can’t turn that around overnight but Maguire has to accept what he is currently doing isn’t working.

He doesn’t need to change his entire coaching philosophy – but he has to adapt. He can’t keep flogging a dead horse.

Maguire needs to be receptive to honest feedback from his most experienced players.

If he has genuine relationships with Adam Reynolds, Payne Haas, Pat Carrigan and Kotoni Staggs then he should be asking them for the playing group’s input.

Maguire can’t let the lunatics run the asylum but he should be aware of their concerns.

The NRL season is a marathon and if Maguire is training the players too hard then he has to pull back.

Captain Adam Reynolds needs to steer the ship. Picture: Getty Images

The competition has never been faster or more physical. Some players feature in upwards of 30 games a year including Origin and Test footy. It is taxing.

The Broncos need to be rolling into game day peaking – not feeling beat-up as former Tigers player Elijah Taylor suggested he was when playing under Maguire. Any elite athlete will say the same thing.

Maguire’s game plan has also been difficult to dissect.

At times Brisbane look to shift the ball early, often making unnecessary mistakes. At other times they play a bland style of low-risk football, seemingly scared to make a mistake.

They haven’t been prepared to build pressure over time and then put their opponents away.

Surely Maguire is giving them a clear plan and it’s Reynolds’ job to execute it.

The Broncos are either not buying in or have fears to express themselves like the grand final team of 2023. For whatever reason, it’s just not working.

Shifting Patrick Carrigan back to lock is a good start.

2. SELECTIONS

Maguire has made a number of selection mistakes this season – but he has time to rectify them.

Shifting Carrigan back to his favoured No. 13 jersey from the front row is a good start.

Maguire will argue his role didn’t change, and Carrigan will refuse to be critical of the decision publicly, but one of the game’s most influential positions was weakened to strengthen another.

Recent NRL benchmarking showed the lock forward position has seen the biggest salary increase over the past year.

Think about the role Blues captain Isaah Yeo plays for Penrith, NSW and Australia – can you picture Ivan Cleary making him a front row battering ram? The Panthers wouldn’t have won four straight titles without Yeo at lock.

Maguire wanted to get Kobe Hetherington into the starting side but he has failed to make the most of the opportunity.

Corey Jensen or Xavier Willison are worthy front row starters alongside Payne Haas.

Maguire has also been unable to make a decision on another key position – hooker.

Cory Paix didn’t play a single NRL game last year, but secured the No. 9 jersey for round 1. After five games he was dumped to the bench and 2023 grand final hooker Billy Walters got five cracks before they switched again.

Meanwhile, highly-rated prospect Blake Mozer, who is carrying a shoulder problem, has been languishing in reserve grade and hasn’t played an NRL game this year.

Cory Paix hasn’t been able to cement the No. 9 jersey. (Photo by Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images)

There’s no doubt Reece Walsh’s absence (knee) has hurt Brisbane’s attack – they have barely fired a shot without him.

Maguire gave Selwyn Cobbo four games at fullback and then switched his most potent try-scoring weapon Jesse Arthars to No. 1 for the Manly game, with minimal preparation, which wasn’t fair.

The Broncos will be a different team when Walsh returns, and Ezra Mam gets more games under his belt, but Maguire has to find an answer at dummy-half. Perhaps that’s Ben Hunt’s destiny.

3. ROSTER

Multiple NRL coaches have told me they would love to inherit a roster like Maguire has.

The Broncos don’t need a rebuild. Brisbane’s list is chock full of representative stars like Haas, Carrigan, Walsh and Cobbo – but it is also overrated.

Maguire has given numerous games to toilers like Gehamat Shibasaki, Jack Gosiewski, Jaiyden Hunt, Fletcher Baker, Marty Taupau and Paix early in the season. They are the guys you call on during an injury crisis or Origin.

The Broncos have also got themselves into a salary cap strangle.

Reynolds was given a one-year extension for the 2025 season, which he indicated would be his last before retirement. The plan was for Reynolds to transition into a coaching role next year.

The Broncos signed Hunt, who didn’t come cheap, for two years on the basis he would succeed Reynolds at halfback in 2026.

When Reynolds backflipped on the decision to retire this year, and indicated he wanted to play next season, the Broncos should have held firm and said “sorry, no deal”.

Instead, they have accommodated his desire to keep going, which has had a knock-on effect and left them in a mess trying to re-sign the likes of Cobbo, Staggs, Mozer, Jensen and Hetherington, among 14 off-contract players.

Such is the predicament, the club is yet to announce a player re-signing this year.

The Broncos have the ingredients for a strong spine, punch up front in Haas and Carrigan to go with strike out wide in Staggs, Cobbo and Arthars.

Carrying five hookers in Paix, Walters, Mozer, Tyson Smoothy and Hunt is too much and they have to make a tough call on Paix to free up space.

Brendan Piakura hasn’t lived up to the hype. (Photo by Brett Hemmings/Getty Images)

Brisbane’s biggest roster hole is in the back row following the fall of 2023 star Jordan Riki.

The top teams have wide-running, damaging back rowers that cause havoc in attack and hit hard in defence.

Think Hudson Young (Raiders), Liam Martin (Panthers), Angus Crichton (Roosters), Jacob Preston (Bulldogs) and Queensland’s best player in Origin I – Jeremiah Nanai (Cowboys).

Riki looked to be that man but has regressed, Gosiewski isn’t explosive and Maguire has gone cold on Brendan Piakura. It’s an area the Broncos must address.

4. DEVELOPMENT

The Broncos have forever been regarded as a development club that has produced a long line of NRL greats. But that production line of talent seems to be drying up.

The players the Broncos have had high hopes for are not kicking on in the NRL, or not at the pace the club had hoped.

Mozer is a great example. Touted as Queensland’s next big thing, Mozer has only played nine NRL games since his 2023 debut and hasn’t featured this year.

He has a shoulder problem, but the time has come for the Broncos to bite the bullet, give him a crack at dummy-half or move on.

Piakura was supposed to be a back row hit-man, but hasn’t stood up consistently in the NRL furnace and the Broncos won’t stand in his way if he wants to leave the club.

Halfback Coby Black is Brisbane’s great No. 7 hope, but he is stuck behind Reynolds and Hunt and seemingly years away from consistent NRL.

Winger Israel Leota has scored 10 tries in the Hostplus Cup this season but hasn’t been trusted to have a go at NRL level.

For whatever reason, the next generation of Broncos talent isn’t developing quickly enough to sustain the production line required. Who is in charge of transitioning the young talent to the NRL?

Penrith is the current the gold standard of development clubs and the Broncos have to find a way to transform promising young prospects into consistent NRL performers.

5. ATTITUDE

There is no doubt Brisbane has the cattle to be a competitive team and they have no excuses when it comes to resources, facilities or the NRL draw.

While the Broncos have missed key players at times, they haven’t had a full-blown injury crisis that has left Maguire scraping the bottom of the barrel to put a team on the park.

Their game plan and structures have been unclear, leading to a clunky attack, but the biggest problem in the recent slide has been defence – and that is attitude.

Coaches and analysts can bang on about systems and structures, but defence comes down to attitude and willingness. Lately, that has been missing.

It was blatantly clear in the opening set of last Saturday’s dreadful 34-6 loss to Manly.

Payne Haas can’t carry the Broncos on his own. Picture: Getty Images

Haas was man-of-the-match in Origin I after playing a starring role for the NSW Blues. He made 27 tackles without missing one in the Origin arena.

But in the first set of the game against Manly, Haas and Hetherington missed a regulation tackle on Sea Eagles fullback Lehi Hopoate.

The limp attempted tackle, in which neither Haas or Hetherington were willing to put their shoulder in, set the tone for the night.

Lacking the perceived star power of the Broncos, ladder-leading Canterbury has built its early-season success on desperate defence.

The Bulldogs play for each other and fight for everything. If one player misses a tackle, another cleans up.

That is what the Broncos are lacking and it doesn’t come down to personnel – it is attitude.

A misfiring attack, and errors, has put Brisbane under enormous defensive pressure, which isn’t helping.

But the Broncos need to show some pride in the jersey against the Titans and only the 17 players pulling it on can do that.

Once they show a change in attitude, some defensive resolve, get in the trenches with the footy and build some confidence and cohesion, the rest will click start to click.

6. LEADERSHIP

The Broncos have never been stronger off the field – posting record revenue of $81 million last year to confirm their status as the NRL’s biggest club.

But the front office has dropped the ball recently.

Broncos CEO Dave Donaghy and chairman Karl Morris made a bold decision to sack Walters when many thought he had the runs on the board to be given a crack at turning things around this season.

If they believed Walters wasn’t going to succeed, then they made the right decision to cut the cord and not waste any more time. There’s no point debating that call now.

But his departure wasn’t handled well. To suggest Walters was standing down, and remaining with the club as an “ambassador”, was misleading.

The club hit Mam with extra fines after the justice system and NRL failed miserably, but ultimately his nine-game punishment didn’t pass the pub test and he is now being booed every week.

Ezra Mam’s drug driving punishment didn’t pass the pub test. Picture NRL Photos

Donaghy has been criticised for reportedly rejecting requests to appear on Fox League’s NRL360, Channel 9’s 100% Footy and Triple M’s Sin Bin to discuss the issues at Red Hill.

The Broncos have lost leadership – on and off the field – in recent years and not replaced it.

Kurt Capewell wouldn’t put up with crap in the dressing room. If he saw something he didn’t like, he would call it out. The Warriors have been blown away by his impact since joining the rising club.

The loss of head of football Ben Ikin also can’t be understated.

The Broncos backed Walters, as they had to, ahead of Ikin after their much-publicised falling out and his departure has been felt.

Donaghy planned to appoint a new football chief but Maguire instead brought in a familiar face in Troy Thomson underneath him.

The Broncos may be too big to not have a dedicated football boss like Frank Ponissi at Melbourne, Matt Cameron at Penrith or Phil Gould at Canterbury.

One of the game’s most respected figures once said to me: “Ben Ikin isn’t everyone’s cup of tea but you know he stands for something.”

Can you say the same about the Broncos at the moment?

Originally published as The six areas Brisbane Broncos coach Michael Maguire must address