Benji Marshall has had enough of the noise.
Fresh off the most humiliating result of his coaching tenure, a 68-0 capitulation to Penrith, the Wests Tigers coach fronted the media on Friday with two fires to put out: the swirling rumour linking the club to a 37-year-old Israel Folau, and the growing narrative that Jarome Luai's future in PNG is poisoning the present in Concord.
Israel Folau has been rumoured to have a sensational comeback after being out of the NRL for more than 15 years, and Marshall straight away responded to the speculation.
"No, we're not signing him," he said.
"I don't talk about recruitment publicly, but that's the furthest thing from my mind. I've seen there have been a lot of reports out there, but I need to get my team back on track.
"I need to focus on what's important right now, and that's us getting a performance we need ... I'm not even going to go down that path."
Folau's brother, David, told Channel Nine that multiple clubs are interested in the former Kangaroos and Wallabies star, who aspires to sign a train-and-trial contract before the June 30 deadline.
Marshall has more pressing problems than accommodating a former NRL star who hasn't played since exiting the Brisbane Broncos in 2010.
Then there's Jarome Luai, who has signed with the PNG Chiefs from the 2028 season, and has been cited by some as a creeping distraction, the reason why the club's season is unravelling.
The Tigers coach rejected this framing, but he understands why it's gained traction.
"I said this at the time - it'll become a distraction if you let it," he said.
"If you don't find the results, then they'll find excuses to make that a distraction ... and we haven't had the results, so people are always going to point to that.
"But it's deeper than that. You don't like making excuses, but we have a lot of our key players out, and what we haven't done is adapt enough.
"You can talk all you want about Jarome's decision to go to PNG, but there are 16 other players or 18 other players in the squad that need to do their job as well."
With the Tigers sitting 10th on the ladder and recently suffering the second biggest loss in the club's history, Marshall knows words alone won't silence the critics.
