{"id":124643,"date":"2021-09-06T01:18:27","date_gmt":"2021-09-06T01:18:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=124643"},"modified":"2021-09-06T01:56:43","modified_gmt":"2021-09-06T01:56:43","slug":"how-bewildering-call-killed-sharks-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=124643","title":{"rendered":"How 'bewildering call' killed Sharks' season"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Sharks may have only missed out on the finals for the first time since 2014 on the last day of the regular season<\/a>, but in reality they sealed their fate in mid April.<\/p>\n

It was then that after just five rounds, the club made the bewildering call to sack coach John Morris<\/a>, who had steered them to back-to-back finals footy in the previous two seasons.<\/p>\n

The Sharks clearly lost their way from there, losing their next five games and they were chasing their tails from that point on.<\/p>\n

MORE:<\/strong><\/em> Titans steal finals berth from Sharks in wild clash<\/strong><\/em><\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"John<\/p>\n

Fill-in coach Josh Hannay<\/a> did a fair job to get the Sharks back in the hunt, but the bottom line is their roster is stronger than a couple of teams that finished ahead of them – and they should be playing in September.<\/p>\n

On the positive side, the future is bright – the Sharks have a good young squad, have bought well and found themselves a highly respected new coach in Craig Fitzgibbon.<\/a><\/p>\n

Young guns Braydon Trindall, Connor Tracy, Jack Williams, Teig Wilton, Sio Talakai, Briton Nikora, Ronaldo Mulitalo, Luke Metcalf, Will Kennedy, Mawene Hiroti and Sione Katoa all came of age and will give Fitzgibbon plenty to work with in 2022.<\/p>\n

Throw in three quality buys and the Sharks could be challening for a top-four spot.<\/p>\n

\"<\/p>\n

Best player:<\/strong> Fullback Will Kennedy – led the Sharks in tries and try assists and will only get better in coming years.<\/p>\n

Biggest disappointment:<\/strong> Josh Dugan – managed just eight games during the season and three tries – well short of previous years. Add to that a couple of off field acts of stupidity and it's easy to see why he will not be required in 2022.<\/p>\n

Key signing:<\/strong> Exciting young utility back Nicho Hynes. Plenty of players have struggled after they've left the Storm – his challenge is to buck that trend.<\/p>\n

\"Nicho<\/p>\n

GAINS<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dale Finucane (Storm), Nicho Hynes (Storm), Cameron McInnes (Dragons)<\/p>\n

LOSSES<\/strong><\/p>\n

Shaun Johnson (Warriors), Chad Townsend (Cowboys), Josh Dugan, Aiden Tolman, Aaron Woods (all released).<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by clicking here!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Sharks may have only missed out on the finals for the first time since 2014 on the last day of the regular season, but […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124643"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=124643"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":124645,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124643\/revisions\/124645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=124643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=124643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=124643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}