It's a good thing New Zealand Rugby retained Black Ferns coach Glenn Moore. He might've struggled to find another job given the reference they provided.
No clear or consistent high-performance vision. Culturally insensitive comments. Poor communication and inconsistent feedback. Ghosting. Body shaming. Heats upfish in the office microwave.
Those allegations were part of an independent review into the Black Ferns environment - well, most of them - not Moore alone. But as the coach he was responsible for that environment and the review made clear there was definitely a bad smell lingering.
Which raises the question: why was Moore retained? It's not like on-field results are so strong as to overwhelm off-field concerns, a trade professional sport always makes.
And if the environment were verging on toxic before, it's hard to see how clearing the air now will freshen things up before the Black Ferns are back in camp.
Moore could have been kept simply because it's too close to this year's World Cup to clean house and start over. But if that is a factor, recent history suggests persisting with Moore may be a mistake.
2. Status quo not the way to go
White Ferns coach Bob Carter speaks to his team. Photo / Photosport
There were no cultural concerns during Bob Carter's recently concluded White Ferns tenure, but there should have been concerns aplenty around what the team produced on the park.
The White Ferns played 32 ODIs against fellow World Cup sides between the end of the 2017 tournament and the end of 2021, winning nine and losing 23.
Despite those results heading into a home World Cup, Carter's position came under pressure only when the White Ferns continued that form and made an early exit.
No coaching masterstroke could have closed the chasm to Australia, who were going to triumph unless a Covid outbreak left the entire team in quarantine.
But a coach should at least make their players better and help the team improve, areas in which Carter was evidently deficient.
The White Ferns were too reliant on a handful of senior players. They developed little depth to pressure the permanent fixtures in the XI. And there were few promising young players breaking through.
But only now, with the tournament having left these shores for another two decades, will the team look for a new leader.
Elite sport is about being proactive but two of our biggest national sides seem far too content to wait and see if things will work out.
3. Control-Z is your friend
The Ferns, black and white, are not alone in the she'll-be-right attitude. Although calls to sack the All Blacks coach are often eye-rollingly premature, they should at least be countered by evidence and reason, not waved away by historical precedent or obfuscated by another structural change.
Last year was predictably subpar for Ian Foster and his bevy of assistants, but maybe Joe Schmidt will sort it. Or Mike Cron. Or perhaps Andrew Strawbridge is needed to oversee skills development. Should someone be recruited to oversee Strawbridge? Is Foster available?
While continuity is desirable and things did indeed work out when vocal calls to sack Sir Graham Henry were rebuffed, let's remember happened the last time Foster stopped coaching a rugby team.
In 2011, under Foster, the Chiefs finished last in Super Rugby's New Zealand Conference with six wins from 18 games. The next season, after Foster had stepped down, Dave Rennie took them to the title, and then did it again the following year for good measure. It's hard to admit a mistake, but one can be undone. Especially if there's a ready-made replacement like Scott Robertson lurking.
4. Doesn't take a genius to appoint one
Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp and Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola. Photo / Getty
Monday morning's Premier League showdown between Manchester City and Liverpool might not have been The Most Important Football Game Since the Big Bang, but it was damn fun.
That owed mostly to the two men standing on the sideline, coaches who have transformed clubs that chose just the right time to turn over control.
Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp signed on at City and Liverpool within a few months of each other, succeeding a couple of decent managers in Manuel Pellegrini and Brendan Rodgers, who have since been made to look like pub-league coaches in comparison.
Their success isn't much of a surprise: Guardiola had won everything at Barcelona, then won everything at Bayern Munich, while Klopp was extremely highly rated from his time at Borussia Dortmund.
The key for City and Liverpool was identifying when to cut bait, rather than persist in the name of continuity, and recruit the obvious replacement.
5. When a loss is a win
Similarly, look at what transpired after Manchester United beat Spurs 3-0 last October. Both struggling clubs were close to changing managers but defeat enabled Tottenham to make their move, appoint Antonio Conte and begin the charge to the all-important top four.
Victory saw United…not do that. After missing out on Conte, whom the club had considered, they have staggered to seventh and sit six points behind Spurs, the hunt for a new full-time manager occupying most of their attention.
No one wants to root for a coach to lose their job - just kidding, both fans and the media love that sh*t. But even in a trigger-happy world of modern sport, being too late to make a change is generally more damaging then switching it up too soon.
And if the new guy sucks, I think we all know the solution.
