COACH’S CORNER: An apology to Benji Marshall

In September 2024, I was absolutely brutal in my assessment of Wests Tigers coach Benji Marshall.

On my Rugby League Coach Podcast, I said (amongst many other brutal things) the following.

“His off season should be spent first with a view of himself, a review of his coaching philosophy, review of structures and processes.

“Some have suggested there have been huge improvements (at Wests Tigers) and that they are headed in the right direction. I'm going to argue that these improvements, if they improve at this rate, they might make the finals sometime in 2038.

“They were trying to throw the ball around and finesse a win when they're not just at that level.”

I didn't stop there.

“They have the worst attack in the competition... he's improved them in terms of two extra wins, but they're still rock bottom of the ladder. My assessment is that they do have some talented attackers, but the basics of the game are absolutely awful. Absolutely awful.

“One thing I noticed is that they play an awful lot between the tram lines. They don't go outside the tram lines very much.

“So, if you (imagine) a rugby league field is 68 meters in width, the first tram line on either side is 10 meters in. So that means the field is 48 meters wide. And the next tram line is another 10 meters in, which makes the field 28 meters wide.

“So, they restrict themselves a lot in their play but they move the ball around a lot, which is giving people the mirage that they are playing more football.”

Beni Quentin Marshall, I owe you an apology. Or at the very least, a huge acknowledgement.

What I see in your Wests Tigers team now is the exact opposite of many of the things I said back in 2024.

Your teams' attack is one of the best ‘eye's up' football teams in the NRL, currently.

The Tigers can attack from anywhere on the field and from any launch point.

If they launch from a play the ball (PTB) in the middle of the field, they'll work out quickly which side of the ruck to attack next and, with consistency, choose the right place to launch said attack.

You see, if you think about defences, they always employ one fullback and two markers, leaving ten players in the main defensive line.

A PTB right in the middle as we look at the field from touchline to touchline, means that a well organised defence should have five defenders on each side of the ball when it is played.

The emphasis here needs to be on the word ‘should'. Often, they don't.

Since the game has turned into one played at break neck speeds, defences often don't get to where they ‘should' be, as the PTB is too fast.

So, just like the Raiders did last weekend, an opposition might only have four or even three defenders on one side of the ball where they should have five, and six or seven on the other when they also should only have five.

Common sense suggests you should attack the defensive side shortest on troops, right?

Well, the thing about common sense is that it isn't all that common. There are many teams in the NRL who don't read these numbers well, and consistently.

Doing so requires a coach to focus on it a lot in training and to have ‘eyes up' as a coaching philosophy. So, all credit goes to Coach Benji here.

And it's not only from this central PTB positioning. They can do it from a ruck anywhere along that imaginary horizontal line that coaches talk about ad nauseum.

Imagine you're on the centre spot of the field, looking directly at a set of posts at one end of the ground.

Imagine the touchline to your left is called ‘zero' and the one on the right is called ‘100'.

A PTB in the middle of the field is known in the game by many as on the ‘50'; one in between there and the ‘zero' is often called the ‘30' and the one directly between ‘50' and the ‘100' is termed the ‘70'.

The ‘30' and the ‘70' are very close to those ‘tram lines' I referred to earlier.

Hitting these spots isn't always an exact science when a game is unfolding. Sometimes, teams end up getting a great PTB on what we could (if we really wanted to) term the '31 and a third' or the '68.5', but good teams don't worry about those details. Near enough to the ‘30' or the ‘70' will do just fine.

Once again, I must praise Benji, whose team are great at recognising the appropriate PTB in which to launch an attack, and waste no time at all in doing so.

This is a trickier way of attacking, as reading the numbers isn't as easy to do.

But what the Wests Tigers have now is some excellent players all over the field, but particularly in the back line.

If they haven't necessarily found ‘space' with their sideways shift (space defined in it's extreme as green grass and fresh air with no defenders in sight) then the Tigers can take comfort in the fact that that they have players that can either evade an opposition marker with great footwork, or overpower them by taking a subtle step before charging straight over them via their weakest defensive shoulder.

In summary, Benji now has the cattle to play the way that he was clearly trying to in 2024. And he's maximising their talents.

In fairness to him, just like Kieran Foran at the Sea Eagles right now, Marshall was, back in 2024, a former superstar of the game turned rookie coach, in his first full year in the dugout.

Yet, unlike Foran, Marshall had been an Assistant to a multi-title winning coach in Tim Sheens for a lengthy time before taking over from him, albeit ahead of schedule.

Therefore I (selfishly) wanted him to be better.

Unlike so many past stars that have tried this coaching caper before him, Marshall clearly has the intellect and has been humble and self-critical enough, to recognise there were things he didn't know back then, and has learned quickly, in tune with his team.

For this, he deserves the upmost respect and huge amounts of credit from this writer who couldn't be happier to see his progress.
Marshall is clearly not an arrogant former legend bequeathed a coaching job well before they were ready; something that (I may) have pegged him as back in 2024.

I stand by the thought that he got the job before he was truly ready.

But in a sign that the perennially bungling Wests Tigers may have finally got a massive decision right, they've afforded their former star turned coach something that so many other coaches could only dream of.

Time in the job. To grow as a coach and grow the tactical maturity of the team.

And Benji Marshall has been smart enough not to waste that opportunity.

Well done Benji, and I am sorry I doubted you.

Lee Addison is a former club coach at Sea Eagles and Panthers and the founder of rugbyleaguecoach.com.au. He is a Coach Mentor and his programmes for coaches and clubs can be found HERE