The stats don’t lie: Dumping Brown the best coaching decision of 2025

3 months ago 20

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The best decision made by a coach in season 2025 belongs to Jason Ryles.

Dumping the defecting Dylan Brown from his Eels side has transformed the team. It was a masterstroke.

It was also a move which further exposed the November 1 transfer rule as the worst rule in world sport.

There’s no room for dead wood in the NRL and the ridiculous November 1 rule means clubs are dealing with dead wood all the time. Having a player, especially one as overhyped and perennially disappointing as Brown, hanging around until he gets overpaid elsewhere is no good for anyone.

Some will argue the Eels should have let him go straight away when he signed, but why should they? He was under contract for 2025 and the Eels rightly decided he’d be doing as he was told. Maybe for the first time.

In round 19, Ryles dropped a game-day bombshell when Brown was shifted to starting hooker for the clash with the Panthers, playing only 35 minutes of the first half before sitting on the bench for the rest of the match. He made one run for four metres with no line breaks, line break assists or try assists.

Ryles wanted to give Joash Papalii a crack at five-eighth, and retained him in the position the following week against the Raiders when Brown was left out of the squad altogether.

Against the Broncos in round 21 and the Storm on Thursday night, he was banished again when Isaiah Ionghi was out injured. Papalii played fullback and Dean Hawkins played in the number six jersey.

The team has suddenly started to play with real purpose and cohesion. The return of Mitch Moses has been crucial, but the absence of Brown has been hugely beneficial.

A gutsy upset win over Brisbane was followed by a gritty and narrow loss to heavyweights the Storm.

The great thing about Ryles’s decision is he has set the team up to start 2026 with a lot of the work done. The last two weeks have been terrific.

Papalii and others are gaining invaluable first grade experience ahead of an off-season of work during which they know a lot more about what to expect as elite players in an elite competition.

Without Brown they’ve lost nothing. Official NRL stats show in 14 full games at five-eighth, he made a paltry six line breaks and seven line break and try assists.

He is outside the top 50 players in the NRL in all three categories, which is nowhere near good enough for a player about to earn more than $1.3m a season.

By comparison, boom Dolphins half Isaiya Katoa has had 19 try assists and 18 line break assists and his halves partner Kodi Nikorima has had ten line breaks.

And that was with their forward pack being decimated with injuries all season.

Sam Walker has only played four matches and has had nine try assists.

Brown is also ranked a lowly 27th for line engagements with 55, said to be his specialty as a running five-eighth.

That’s equal with Cody Walker who’s played only eight matches. On top is Katoa with 202 followed by Tom Dearden with 131 and Nicho Hynes with 124. Luke Brooks has had 109.

It makes for horror reading and Newcastle fans must be wondering what on earth their club has done throwing more than ten per cent of the team’s salary cap for the next ten years at a player who’s already past the mid-point of his career and is one of the worst halves in the competition in all stat categories.

The November 1 rule which allows players to sign for rival clubs a full year out from the end of their contracts - is to blame. It creates a fever and a frenzy which, at times, is completely out of check with reality. As it was in the Brown case. A desperate $14m throw at the stumps.