Warriors axe Brown, Jones interim coach

Nathan Brown has coached his last game for the Warriors, with the NRL club parting ways with the veteran coach.

Former Warriors coach Tony Kemp has warned the club faces an uphill battle to attract a new coach after Nathan Brown became the fifth mentor in 10 years to leave the club.

Brown’s tenure as coach was terminated early on Tuesday morning, following a meeting in the aftermath of the club’s fifth straight loss.

New Zealand great Stacey Jones has been appointed on an interim basis, having only taken up the assistant’s role at the end of last season.

Brown had been contracted at the Warriors until the end of next year, but had already told officials he did not want to move back to New Zealand long-term and could not commit beyond that.

Ultimately though, the club’s poor start to 2022 and Saturday night’s horror outing against Manly meant officials decided to move immediately.
“We fully appreciate his position and the call he has made,” CEO Cameron George said.

“Given those circumstances we agreed we needed to make an immediate change.”

The decision leaves Brown’s career at a crossroads, having previously coached both St George Illawarra and Newcastle in the NRL.

Brown becomes the second coach to go in the NRL this year, after Trent Barrett’s exit from Canterbury last month.

Wests Tigers coach Michael Maguire also remains in the firing line, with the joint-venture’s mid-season probe pushed back a week due to an ill Tim Sheens.

If he is axed by the Tigers, Maguire could potentially loom as an option for the Warriors given he currently has the Kiwis job.

Tonga coach Kristian Woolf would be another genuine contender, while Cameron Ciraldo and Jason Ryles are considered the next coaches in waiting as NRL assistants.

The likes of Shane Flanagan and Paul Green are also hoping to get back into the coaching game.

Whether any of that group would choose to take charge of the Warriors is another story.

The Warriors have now gone through five full-time coaches in the past 10 years, while Todd Payten also spent the best part of a season in charge in an interim role before knocking them back for North Queensland.

They have also endured a bad run ahead of next year’s move back to New Zealand after COVID, with Matt Lodge, Euan Aitken and Kodi Nikorima all exiting the club.

“It looks like we have a structure that people don’t want to be associated with,” former coach Kemp told radio station SEN.

“It comes on the back of a number of things.

“It shows there is a weak underbelly at the club currently and the people who run the club need to sort it out.”

Kemp claimed the club needed change at the top, with owner Mark Robinson taking a backward step.

“If he doesn’t step out of what is going on at the moment, I can’t see a coach of any calibre saying I am going to come and set something up,” Kemp said.

“That’s just not going to work.

“Our average coach gets a couple of years to rebuild it all again, and try and get some success in the club.”