One Wayne out...one Wane in

Rugby league is a tight-knit community. By its nature, that means it is difficult for information to stay secret for too long. This was true of Wayne Bennett’s departure from the role of England coach and replacement with Shaun Wane.

Bennett’s departure appears to be as a result of a humiliating whitewash of the Great Britain and Irish Lions in their Pacific Tour of October and November 2019. As an aside, Bennett’s departure surely ends that façade that Great Britain was anything other than England in a sharper-looking kit.

Wayne Bennett’s time at England was an enigma. The players and coaching staff spoke with genuine enthusiasm about Bennett’s abilities and management. This contrasted with Bennett’s external appearance, which was one of bewilderment, that of a man who did not seem to even know where he was, let alone make a coherent attempt of coaching a national team.

Examples of this were plentiful, from his curt interviews with journalists to openly yawning at one of the very few Super League matches he attended. The best and most recent example of his idiosyncrasies came from Love Rugby League’s weekly gossip column, which reported that upon first meeting, Bennett believed that his assistant coach Paul Wellens was in fact a player!

In Bennett’s defence, he did guide England to their first World Cup final in 22 years and to a series win over New Zealand. But the good work done in 2017 and 2018 was outstripped by an abject, insipid performance in the Great Britain tour. A tour littered with mind-boggling decisions, such as to play Blake Austin on the wing, fly Ash Handley halfway around the world for one game, and keep Blake Austin on the wing!

Now on to his replacement Shaun Wane. A man with some similarities to Bennett, but many differences. If Wane’s tenure at Wigan is anything to go by, then Bennett’s overly-relaxed manner will be a thing of the past, to be replaced by a relentless, win-at-all-costs mentality.

Wane is a proven winner. He won every honour in the game during a six-year tenure at Wigan, including three Super League titles. Often, he didn’t have the best squad, but he still got his team to win. And success is something that has evaded the national team for generations.

One of the main criticisms levelled at Bennett was at his negative, defensive play. That is something unlikely to change under Wane. His win-at-all-costs mentality means that style of play is low down the list of priorities. That may be one reason that despite years of success, Wigan’s average attendance dropped by 6,000 during his time as Wigan head coach.

However, is style of play important if you win? That is a question that we hopefully we will find out the answer to over the next two years!

This is the most exciting two years in English international rugby league that I can recall. The first Kangaroos tour in 17 years starts in October, with a 16-team home World Cup next year. The RFL could ill-afford to enter this exciting period under a cloud of keeping Wayne Bennett as head coach.

Wane’s appointment has broadly been welcomed and giving fans something to be excited about is key ahead of this critical period in the international game. As always, predicting what will happen is impossible. One thing that we can be certain of is that Wane will leave no stone unturned in his quest to take England to the top of the rugby league world.