{"id":309196,"date":"2023-06-17T21:21:21","date_gmt":"2023-06-17T21:21:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=309196"},"modified":"2023-06-17T22:58:58","modified_gmt":"2023-06-17T22:58:58","slug":"bennett-spills-on-wally-call-that-shattered-a-friendship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=309196","title":{"rendered":"Bennett spills on Wally call that 'shattered' a friendship"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wayne Bennett<\/a> says he has "no regrets" over the bombshell 1989 decision that divided Brisbane<\/a> and ended\ufeff the friendship of the state's two biggest stars.<\/p>\n

The supercoach famously sacked Wally Lewis<\/a> as captain of the Broncos following the 1989 season, and handed the honour to Lewis' best mate Gene Miles.<\/p>\n

Lewis – who Bennett had recruited to be the club's inaugural captain in 1988 – started the following season \ufeffat Red Hill but then quit after only nine games, and joined the Gold Coast Seagulls where he finished his career.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Keary facing weeks off after freak collision<\/strong><\/a>\ufeff<\/strong><\/p>\n

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"(Bennett) stared at me for about two or three minutes… (he said) 'I'm taking captaincy off you'," Lewis recounted in Nine's documentary The King<\/em>, which airs Tuesday.<\/p>\n

"He wanted whoever was the captain to not be available for representative football. That wasn't my plan for the future.<\/p>\n

\"Wayne<\/p>\n

"He didn't beat around the bush, Wayne. He told me the areas of my captaincy which he thought were disappointing.\ufeff"<\/p>\n

Bennett has rarely, if ever, spoken about his decision in the 34 years since.<\/p>\n

He was again quizzed about it when interviewed for the documentary, and offered a small insight.<\/p>\n

Nine will premiere 'The King' documentary on Tuesday night at 9.10pm (AEST). Watch 'The King' on Nine and<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a>!\ufeff<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

"Wally was distracted and we needed a new captain. Simple as that," Bennett said.<\/p>\n

"I've never spoken publicly about it, and I promise you today I'm not going to speak publicly about the conversation and why it was done.<\/p>\n

"No regrets, nope.\ufeff"<\/p>\n

\"Wayne<\/p>\n

If taking the captaincy from him didn't anger Lewis enough, Bennett then handed the armband to Miles – a long-time friend and teammate of The King.<\/p>\n

It was a decision that tainted the relationship between the pair, and Miles believes it's never been fully repaired.<\/p>\n

"That's 33 years ago… he's nearly over it," Miles tells the documentary.<\/p>\n

"If anybody was going to take the captaincy it's somebody that he would respect, and would just go along with it. Holy Jesus… was I wrong. That just didn't happen.<\/p>\n

"That shattered the friendship. We haven't been at the fences since then.\ufeff"<\/p>\n

\"Wayne<\/p>\n

While Lewis now regrets how he reacted\ufeff, he admits at the time he was livid with both Bennett and Miles.<\/p>\n

"Gene grabbed me one day and said 'I've been offered the captaincy'. I said, 'OK… so do you think I was a shit captain?'," Lewis reveals.<\/p>\n

"I said to Gene, 'if you want it bad enough, you take it', and I walked away like a spoiled school kid.<\/p>\n

"I was a little bit angry, moreso at Wayne I think, and I unfairly took it out on Gene. Although Wayne was right to make the decision he thought was best for the Broncos' future.\ufeff"<\/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<\/strong><\/em> clicking here<\/strong><\/em><\/a>!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wayne Bennett says he has "no regrets" over the bombshell 1989 decision that divided Brisbane and ended\ufeff the friendship of the state's two biggest stars. […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":309199,"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\/309196"}],"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=309196"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309196\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":309203,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309196\/revisions\/309203"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/309199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=309196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=309196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=309196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}