Former Kiwis coach Michael Maguire has turned around the Broncos. Photo / www.photosport.nz
Back in late-April, I caught up with Michael Maguire for the first time since his departure as Kiwis coach in November 2023.
Standing in the bowels of Go Media Stadium in Auckland, it wasn’t a happy occasion for the 51-year-old, whose team had just been beaten in golden point by the Warriors.
The loss, off the back of a shock defeat to a depleted Roosters outfit a week earlier, was also marred by an injury to star fullback Reece Walsh, who would spend six weeks on the sideline. With a 3-3 record, pressure was slowly building, and Maguire wasn’t immune to it.
“That’s the way it is, you’ve just got to keep going, Mick, keep doing what you know works,” said Maguire, as we chatted briefly after the press conference. “We are building something here, and I believe in this group.”
Around that time, not everybody did. Brisbane beat the Bulldogs the following week, but that was a brief respite before four consecutive losses; smashed by struggling Penrith 32-8, upset by Souths and the Dragons, then beaten 34-6 at the hands of Manly.
At that stage – early June – the knives were out, as the Broncos had fallen from second to 12th in six weeks.
Plenty of Brisbane old boys were calling for his head, while the media didn’t hold back. Veteran Daily Telegraph scribe Phil Rothfield broke a story about Maguire bringing his team to Sydney three days before the Rabbitohs defeat to go on a harbour cruise, then published details of a “blazing row” with Maguire after the coach called him to question the article.
“There are problems at the Broncos, aren’t there ... I make a lot of phone calls,” Rothfield would say on a subsequent radio appearance. “I’m told there are problems there. Madge’s relationship with some of the players.”
Rothfield and other journalists alleged the players were being ‘over-trained’, part of Maguire’s reliance on “old school methods”. It was brutal and at times felt like a campaign against him, but Maguire has had the last laugh, with Brisbane’s stunning turnaround, capped off by their remarkable 16-14 win over Penrith in the preliminary final to reach Sunday’s grand final.
The Broncos won 10 of their last 12 regular-season matches to sneak into the top four, then had their Houdini golden point victory in Canberra, albeit aided by a couple of controversial refereeing decisions.
What Maguire has achieved has been remarkable, especially turning around the culture and environment at the Broncos, where there had been several off-field issues, along with subpar performances from a talented roster (12th in 2024). In the process, Maguire has also rebuilt his own reputation.
After the epic 2014 grand final triumph with the Rabbitohs, which had been preceded by two preliminary final appearances, he fell from grace. Souths finished 12th in the next two seasons, followed by four fruitless campaigns at the Wests Tigers between 2019-2022.
But it always felt that the problems at the joint venture club ran much deeper than the coach, as has been proven in recent seasons with wooden spoons there under Tim Sheens (2022) and Benji Marshall (2023). The Tigers haven’t got close to the finals since 2019, when Maguire took them to within a point of the top eight.
Since his Rabbitohs tenure, Maguire has had to change, to grow, to evolve. Maybe at times he was too intense, too hard-nosed, too single-minded. But Maguire is also a special coach, driven, competitive and a winner. That was obvious in the way he turned around the Kiwis, who were at rock bottom after the 2017 World Cup when he arrived.
He rebuilt pride in the jersey, elevated the culture and got results; unbeaten against Tonga and Samoa, a 3-3 record against England and two wins in five transtasman tests, including the stunning 30-0 thumping of Australia in Hamilton in 2023.
The most telling sign was the way players improved under his tutelage, as well as the belief that was engendered, even if big names were unavailable or injured, or others were played out of position. Maguire made the Kiwis into a resilient, strong group, then repeated the dose with New South Wales in 2024, winning their first series decider in Brisbane since 2005.
Now – after being written off as a club coach in some quarters – he has managed another turnaround, taking Brisbane to just their third grand final in 20 years. The spirit of the new Broncos was epitomised in last Sunday’s win, with their comeback from 14-0 down against the four-time premiers. In 98 previous matches since 2020 when the Panthers held a lead of 12 or more they had never been beaten, but Maguire’s men found a way.
They will be underdogs again on Sunday against the Melbourne Storm – who have much more big game experience and the advantage of two extra days’ rest – but it would be foolish to write off Brisbane.
Maguire certainly won’t be.
Michael Burgess has been a sports journalist for the New Zealand Herald since 2005, covering the Olympics, Fifa World Cups, and America’s Cup campaigns. He is a co-host of the Big League podcast.