Craig Fitzgibbon Interview: Pre-Season 2025

[00:00:01] The Royal Motor Yacht Club Port Hacking is a hidden gem of the Shire, situated on the banks of the beautiful Port Hacking. It's a great place to catch up with friends, celebrate your birthday or any special occasion, and they always show the NRL live on the big screens. The RMYC Port Hacking, proud sponsors of this podcast and big supporters of the Cronulla Sutherland Sharks. Check out their website rmycph.com.au

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[00:01:05] Hey there, welcome to SharkCast, part of the podcast dedicated to the greatest sporting club in the history of the world, the mighty Cronulla Sutherland Sharks. My name is Sam Shinazzi, OG2015, supporting the team a lot longer than that. And this show is brought to you by Dyson Logistics, the Royal Motor Yacht Club in Port Hacking, and Jason Hawes of Crips & Crips Real Estate. And we have a very special episode coming up for you all. Hope you get to enjoy the entire episode. And that is with our head coach, Craig Fitzgibbon. He was kind enough to give me some time.

[00:01:35] And we sat down and got into all sorts of things about rugby league, about the Cronulla Sharks, and even a bit of Ted Lasso. So, hope you enjoyed it. I had a great time doing it. He's a fascinating person to talk to, and I really appreciate the time that he took for all of our listeners. It's a big month in Sharkland, a big year coming up, and you can hear all about what's going on via Craig's thoughts.

[00:02:01] And we have trial matches coming up, which he addresses in about a week's time. So, Friday next week, we play the Warriors at Shark Stadium. If you're a member, you get in free, and you need to sort of prove that you're a member, of course, at the gate. Otherwise, you can purchase tickets. Then the following Thursday, we play down at Canberra against the Raiders. Also of note, which we've been talking about, and we'll do more talking about, is the Hall of Fame for the Sharks.

[00:02:27] And that is on Tuesday the 18th, down at Shark Stadium. You can also buy tickets to go to that. We'll be down there covering it in as many ways as we can, so stay tuned to that. And it's a really cool time to be a Sharks fan. Vegas is coming up. I know a bunch of you are going over. I know a bunch of you are not as well. But we'll be doing the best we can to cover that for everyone, both on the ground and off the ground, of course.

[00:02:54] So if you can't go, we're going to try and make up for that via our episodes and our socials and that kind of thing. So stay tuned and all that. Thank you so much for all of your support for the episodes this year. Of course, years gone by. You can get in touch with us, sharkcastpod.gmail.com. We're on the socials. We are just super excited to get this season underway. Until we speak again, which will be probably before you know it, we have Mr. Craig Fitzgibbon coming up. Give it a listen.

[00:03:22] I'm walking away inspired like I was. Thanks again. Up up. Okay. Welcome back to Shark Cast Pod. We are here with the man in charge making his second appearance officially on the show. Sometimes we get him after a game and say quick hello. But this is Craig Fitzgibbon. Welcome back to the show, sir. Thanks for having me. How are you? Yeah, not bad. We joking this morning. We're on top of the comp. We're undefeated. Everyone's bigger, faster, fitter, stronger.

[00:03:49] So, no, we have, it's kind of a background joke for most clubs where, you know, you have that whole preseason underway or getting to the end of the preseason, to be honest, where, yeah, optimism and hope. And then every now and again, you're not sure because you haven't played yet. So, but I've got to say, I can't fault the players and the attitude as to where they're at at the moment. What's the offseason look like for the coach? So, we know we finish up in late September. When do you have a break? When do you come back?

[00:04:18] What's, how is it for you sort of with your mental health and everything else? When do you get a little bit of a break? I like to review the season pretty quickly with, we usually grab every individual player, just have a quick summary, you know, strengths, what they want to hang on to, some areas to think about, what to come back with. So, we went through that pretty quickly and then they have a medical and then we like to review quickly with the staff and the coaches mostly.

[00:04:44] And then upon returning, we actually have a staff camp where we review the season and it's entirety department by department, individual by individual. And then we set up how we go about things for the next year. But we, no, I had a good offseason to be honest. I sooked basically for a month.

[00:05:05] I'm not, I'm not good at, you know, to have so much hard work and joy, experiences, highs, lows, everything that goes into a season. To have it end like that, it really hurt and takes a bit of time to take the lessons as to why. But then, yeah, obviously you need to pay some time back to family, friends and yourself.

[00:05:30] And then, yeah, went to, actually went to Brit's wedding in Bali and I had a surf there, went to Roti in West Timor and got some waves and then come back, got a couple of weeks work done and basically, yeah, got back into it as quick as possible though. All right. It sounds like a busy offseason for you as well. Oh yeah, it is. It's always busy. Like I think as soon as you finish the season, the contract stuff starts, there's always something going on, your phone never stops.

[00:05:54] But it's still nice to actually sit with your family and kids and have three meals a day together and go surfing together and do the things you love to do where you don't always get time. So it's, no, it was, whilst it was, fills the cup back up, you're also, you're still looking forward to starting again. Let's talk about last season, a pretty successful year, 20 minutes from a grand final. You talked about highs and lows. It was a weird one. We had players stood down.

[00:06:22] We had injuries, critics against us all year round. I thought it was one of the more successful seasons in living memory for us, like as fans. I want to talk about a few highlights. The Melbourne game in Melbourne. I'm not just saying this to you now. I reckon it was one of the best coached games I've ever seen. Like, Nico goes down, what, 24 hours before? A bit less. The way you shuffled that team around was just remarkable. An amazing win.

[00:06:52] Can you give us a bit of insight behind that and what that 24 hours was like and your memories about the game? Yeah, sure. Thanks for that, first of all. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. Sometimes your most enjoyable weeks are surprises. You don't see them coming. Usually it's in the face of adversity. And we had a couple of other really enjoyable weeks with when the injury toll had hit. Obviously, we'd had Dale, issue with Dale and then Tricky there.

[00:07:21] Yeah, so, but I felt like, yeah, I've got to thank the coaches as well. We're pretty tight. We discussed a lot of stuff and we needed confidence in each other's planning that we could come up with a plan that was going to work. Now, at the end of the session, what happened was, actually had a guest, Dean Vickerman, who's coached at Melbourne United, was watching the session. And right at the end of the session, it was almost finished. I looked over and I just saw Nico, the look on his face. It was kind of like assessing, you know, sometimes they get something happens to you.

[00:07:51] You just stare off into the abyss and he was like, he was training and he was doing extra training, which he didn't have to do. But then I looked at him and walked up to him and said, you just hurt yourself. He goes, I'm not sure. And I was like, OK, here we go. And I was talking to Dean Vickerman as I walked up. I said, I think we just might have lost our main man then. And then the bus ride back to the hotel after training was, is he hurt? Is he not hurt? You know, you've got to wait for the assessment. You've got to get scans. You've got to see, is it a strain? Is it tight? Yeah, et cetera.

[00:08:20] It was a little calf issue, so it wasn't significant. But with the calves, as you know, it's always dependent on the location of where it is. We quickly grabbed the coach on the bus, said, look, I think Nico's had his calf here. So got back to the hotel, quickly organised a meeting with the coaches and said, well, what are our options? What are we going to do? Then we strategised it out on who we thought best could manage that. How best could we control the way we wanted to play and simplify things when you lose someone who does,

[00:08:50] is sort of central to how you organise. We thought simplicity was going to be the key. And to beat Melbourne, you probably need to have the hardest parts, the simplest parts of the game done really well. So we felt confident that we could do that. And then, yeah, a little bit of a risk in whether we were going to earn points. But we felt like that was probably the hardest thing on seeing the creativity or where we're going to make points against Melbourne, who are a good defensive team, right?

[00:09:17] So we just simplified and we sort of found out points, to be honest. Harry Grant got Simbin, we fleeced one then. And I think Oregon and Took both scored in the middle, which is if you have an extra middle on the field, you'd like to think you can score tries there. Jesse got us a barge over try. So it's funny how if your attitude, effort and connectivity is good, you find points. And then the last time we see if it was, that was awesome. Like that was such a... An amazing rugby league try for starters. Yeah. But then what it meant. Yeah.

[00:09:46] We all knew it was over then. Yeah. We saw the rise of Dan Atkinson. Yeah. Absolute clutch game from him. Braley and McInnes doing their things. It was just, as a fan, like I can think of, I don't know, 10 games in the last maybe 20 years that I'm so proud. I just want to burst, you know? And that was one of them. We were in that run where they were like, oh, you're not going to win any of these next four or five games. You're playing these. And we just kept knocking them over.

[00:10:13] I just always come back to that game now as when they say you can't do it. Well, look what these guys just did. Yeah. We fell on that. That's, you can control your narrative to some extent. I think in, with a credit to the players here, there's been a number of narratives or hoodoos or things that everyone tells us. Like from the time I walked in the door is we can't win at Brookvale. Yeah.

[00:10:42] We've managed to do that a few years and we can't beat Canberra. We've managed to do that. We can't beat Melbourne. We've had a couple of those. Obviously, we've been beaten badly by Melbourne as well. So it's not, it's not as if we've broken all of our hoodoos. Yeah. We can't. That's what last year represented to me. Yeah. Sorry to interrupt you, but we can't win at Suncorp. Yeah. Well, we can. Yeah. Not only does that say a lot about you and your staff, but the current mob that you've got.

[00:11:09] That's why when you rock up and play Penrith in the prelim, and we'll get to that, 90% of the roadbilly community are saying, uh-uh. There's 10% who believe because of what we've seen. Mm-hmm. Uh, and I think having that moving forward over the next few years, well, there's no reason why you can't do anything. Yeah. We feel like, again, you can only play what's in front of you and you can't go and dispel all those myths, narratives or whatever in one fell swoop. It's been a gradual progression over a couple of years, but it was a year for a lot of those. Um, that's for sure.

[00:11:38] Um, and in the face of that, you know, obviously tricky Dale, um, missing a number of players throughout the course of the year. Then Niko goes down, Akko steps up. We had a number of hurdles and I think what the hardest period, but the most growth in ourselves, I thought we had was we had a mid year period where we lost a lot of couple, like a lot of close games. Yeah. Now, you find out about yourself when you, if you get belted, you pretty much go away that week and you respond, you train hard and you're going to get a response the week after.

[00:12:07] When you're actually playing close and you don't ice a game, you don't quite win, they're harder to get back up. Now we had a number of those. Yeah. But gee, I didn't see anyone flinch. I didn't see anyone think that we needed to do stuff different. I felt like, you know, a lot of external noise in that time was that was, that was, you feel that even if you don't look at it, read it, it finds a way in. And then I felt like the players were like, I said, look, how you lose is important. Sometimes we don't want to lose. No one wants to lose. You don't set up to lose. We want to win every time we play.

[00:12:36] But if you lose, gee, you better be, you have good effort. You got to have good team spirit. You got to have good connectivity. And if you don't, we just haven't represented ourselves well enough. We've had some tactical elements, discipline elements. You haven't got right. But if the main parts of what forms a team and a club are there, then you can sort of move on pretty quickly. I thought that, that was impressive from the players not to get rattled by that and find a way out.

[00:12:59] So I was here at media slash training when Nico's knee blew up or his ankle, whatever it was. There's been a few times in my life, thankfully touch wood, where I've heard pin drop silence. Yep. And everyone kind of knew it was bad. He was in a lot of pain.

[00:13:20] Within, I think, 90 seconds to two minutes, I saw you and Cam McInnes gather Will Kennedy, Dan Atkinson, Blake Braley, and have the spine chat. And you guys were in a small little huddle. And I was just watching that going, it's going to be tough, but we're going to be okay. Like the response, that was so impressive. Yeah.

[00:13:48] Once again, that was Cam's leadership. He really stepped up last year in his performances. And yeah, just on that, I think you do need, you need the connectivity of the whole team, first of all. The spine are going to drive the way you play, the way you do things, of course. But, you know, Phil, even the year before against the Roosters here, our spine was, you know, Hines and Tricky had only played a handful of games together.

[00:14:14] We had Connor had only played five games, I think, in the spine as a fullback and then Blake. So we've constantly had challenges to continuity to our spine there in big moments, big games. So we've got some lessons out of that on what you have to do. And we just pretty quickly have had some experience on losing those players and managed to come up with a strategy around that. But the players have still got to buy in and believe it. No, they did. They drove it.

[00:14:44] They felt like they'd worked so hard to get to that point. We weren't going to let anything derail us. And then, you know, thankfully they didn't. But, you know, still, I think all these positives and there's so much like optimism, things to look forward to, growth, development, et cetera. But it still hurts. So we didn't get it done. Yeah. Well, let's get to that. Week one against Melbourne definitely could have played better. Mm-hmm. We should have known why we lost. We were in it for, I don't know, 50 minutes.

[00:15:13] Let it go. Moved on. I came here again for media week and it was packed. It wasn't just me and Rikio and whoever. It was tens of people asking the same questions to the same people. And I've never heard so much of doomsday in my life. I was just sort of sitting back chuckling going, you guys are just, like, I know the narrative. Yeah. I get your job. But also, come on. Yeah. They're talking to, you know, a grown man, our superstar,

[00:15:43] and asking him things like, do you think you can win or have, you know, just ridiculous questions. I hadn't said anything like that before, at least in the flesh. We go to Alleyne Stadium, really great game. Trindle's unbelievable, obviously leading the way. They're all really good. And there's a lot of hope going into the Penrith game. Then there's injuries. We had, who did we have? We had, Jesse didn't play. Is that right? No, Jesse didn't play. Kale was injured. Kale got hurt.

[00:16:11] Sifah hadn't been able to train for a number of weeks. Yeah. We're pretty much wrapping him up and throwing him out there as well. Yeah. There was a couple others there, which again, everyone's probably got knocks at that stage of the year. But we had a bit of internal stuff going on then. Yeah. But then to come out in the rain, and in my opinion, I don't know if this is too dramatic, but give it to Penrith for like a good 40, 45, 50 minutes. And we're right in that hustle.

[00:16:37] And for me, there's one thing that's stopping us winning that game, and that's the drop ball. Like it was just every second set. And I get that it's wet weather. But like you stewing over the game, I was stewing over that for a month going, why don't they just hold the ball? I know it's easy said and done. Is that where you think we lost it? In discipline, so to speak? Yeah, absolutely. I think on Penrith, they're the only team. We just haven't performed against them. We've had 22. I thought we played well out there.

[00:17:07] We got back 20 to 10. Got a lesson here. We were about 23. We had a number of injuries in game. We got a lesson out there. It was an NRL record for a number of tackles from Cam, but the actual number of goal line sets we had to defend was like 30-something goal line sets we had to defend in a game. It's unheard of. But we've also done that to ourselves. And what I was really frustrated, I thought we played really style of footy, some simple rules, laws to the game that you need to follow.

[00:17:35] I thought we adjusted really well from Melbourne. A lesson in that was we were competitive when we were trading, really competitive the whole game. We got into half-time. You're in the game. Yeah. But then we come out, and again, with discipline, yeah, that can come via being offside penalties and high-pressure stakes experience, which we don't have a great deal of, lack of representative players, et cetera, versus teams that have plenty of either finals,

[00:18:02] wins, losses, grand finals, origins, et cetera. So that experience that we gathered out of that, I thought set up the Cowboys game, then we deliver on what we needed to do, played our way, controlled the game, and then that's what we feel like we're capable of. But yeah, I was hurt really badly after that, and we all were. Yeah. It's not just me. It's the staff, and we didn't play the conditions or assert pressure how we set up. Now, was that a response to the pressure of the situation?

[00:18:32] Was that a relief due to the win the week before? Like, the narrative around not winning semis was enormous, as you said. Yeah. Potentially did the relief of, yeah, we got one done the week before affect us mentally prep. That's, we've assessed all that as staff, but at the end of the day, we put that pressure on ourselves in the Penrith game. That's why I say disappointed, because I don't think you can fight our effort. I don't think you can fight. We had no field position, no opportunities, no whatever, and we're still there.

[00:19:00] And at the end of the day, we just, the tidal wave of that much, you know, lack of ball, defence, et cetera, they overwhelmed us, and that's how they win. They win that every year. So, great lesson. Can we bridge that gap again? Can we go after it again? We'll find out in a couple of weeks, I suppose, in Vegas. All right. Well, let's get to this year, this season. We know that Fanua Blake's coming. I know you've, I know the whole club's done a lot of press about him. Can you just, for our audience, tell us about Adden? What's he like off the field? What's he like at training? Yeah, very measured.

[00:19:30] He feels, probably a sign of his humility is, he didn't want to walk in, and he's got a real leadership presence about him. He doesn't speak often, but he's very, he's got a high footy IQ. He loves the game, studies the game. When he offers his input, it's actually spot on. He's got a good cadence about him as to when to do that. He doesn't speak for the sake of it. He holds it back. He speaks at the right time.

[00:19:57] And he's been very deliberate on, I need to earn their trust. I need to earn their respect. I need to, I need to connect with these guys. I need to make sure that I'm, I'm part of this crew before I, you know, and then it's sort of gradually through those connections, he's getting more and more connected and confident and speaking a little bit more. And without overdoing it, he still feels like he's, he's got to earn everyone's trust and respect. And I'm, yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing him doing that.

[00:20:24] And, you know, clearly being watching him play for Tonga, New Zealand, Warriors, like everyone's obvious what he's capable of. But when you see him deliver that, you know, in training sessions against the others, and you see other players wanting to play alongside him and other players want to learn from him, then that's a, that's a powerful inclusion so far. Still, still in its infancy though, we've got, we've got more to do.

[00:20:51] As a coach, is it just finding the best role and way for him to play this season? Or are you basing a lot on what he's done last year for the Warriors and just going to slot him in and do the same thing? How does that kind of work? I think the way we play, the way we play, we want to allow players to access their, their strengths, their style. I don't, it would be madness to sign a player who's nearly the best front row in the game and say, you can only do this, you can only do that. Yep.

[00:21:21] We've got to allow a guy that freedom to be him and the best version of him. So he's, and the way we play, he's excited about how he thinks he can fit in. His style of play into our style of play. So, yeah, I don't, I don't think it makes sense for me to sign a player of his caliber and tell him what not to do. I mean, do you have in your mind how many minutes he'll play that kind of thing or are you just waiting and seeing? No, not necessarily. Like if he's out there and playing strong and delivering, he'd keep playing.

[00:21:50] That's generally how we work it. We had obviously some instances last year where we had Oregon play the entire first half a few times for us. You know, Tommy was chewing up 30 minutes in the first half a couple of times. Sometimes we leave Cam on the entire half. So now we're going with a rough plan with interchange. We're going with a rough plan of, you know, like most clubs, you can either go four forwards or three in a utility. We've got the ability to do both this year, which is great. But generally, you, sometimes you gotta allow players to be great.

[00:22:20] Like if they're playing great, let them keep playing great. You know? Well, I've got you on the bench. Like how do you adapt week to week with three forwards and a utility versus, is it who you play? Is it the fitness of our guys? Like how does that work? Yeah. It's fluid because even if you did think you wanted to go four forwards or what if one of those four forwards is not able to train, compromise. Say, say for instance, if you have four forwards on the bench, sometimes it can be because one of the starters has got an injury.

[00:22:50] Yeah. An illness where you might be thinking, I don't know if I'll get the time. You might need to cover that on the bench. Mm-hmm. And then alternatively, sometimes there's a back that's carrying something that you need to go, okay, if we're to lose him, we better have adequate cover. Yeah. And we do have a number of players that can play multiple positions. So we don't have a hard, fast rule on it. Traditionally, we have done the four with the power of our team. Mm-hmm. But not opposed to either. We'll play that out as we see.

[00:23:19] It's hard to make a clear cut determination at this stage because you don't know what's going to present in front of you for that particular week. We've got trials coming up in about a week's time they start. Are you able to say anything about who we're going to, not specifically who we're going to see, but the type of player we're going to see week one versus week two, et cetera? Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay about that. The Canberra trial, which is the second one, we'll try and audition roughly close to how we want to play.

[00:23:45] I think that's close enough to the first game against Penrith. I'd like to push that trial as close as we can. Obviously not a full 80-minute performance. You're still going to use the interchanges because it's unlimited. You can use 26 players, I think, maybe 28 this year. But for the first one, we would have some guys that we want to get another banker working. I'm not sure of the number, but possibly we have picked the teams, but we'll get a lot of young guys, a lot of trainers, a lot of players that have done the preseason.

[00:24:14] We'll get some time against the Warriors, which will be a great challenge because I think they're going to go strong. So that'll be an interesting dynamic, good challenge, real good opportunity. I feel like the young guys that come in or even contracted jets, some are on train and trial, they just earned the right to have an opportunity to play. They've done really well, so I'm excited for them. I want to give them that chance. Some of them will get less than others, but there's some players that we'll have to

[00:24:43] probably rely on for more minutes. But it should be an exciting view of some potential, hopefully. But yeah, Canberra will probably try and line up a little bit stronger. Okay. How do you feel during trials? Are you like the fans? Are you on the edge of your seat just saying no injuries, no injuries, no injuries? No, that comes in here more through training for me, to be honest. Like, you've got to prepare them for the trial. Yeah, the last few sessions, watching the players go at it, I had some moments there,

[00:25:12] for sure. It's obviously the nature of the beast. People get hurt. So I feel like a good committed performance from everyone, you generally don't get too many. So once the players commit, and they're focused on it, like, you know, they really want to get out there and play, generally it works out alright. I think injuries come many different ways. Some of them are life, like a social event, some of them are under-preparedness, some are over, some are, you know. So there's a multitude of ways, but I think a good connected team performance, it doesn't,

[00:25:43] it's less scary than watching training. We are looking at where in a few weeks we're going to have the Hall of Fame, which is super exciting. What are your thoughts on that? You must be pretty amped, being the gentleman that's had so much history in this club through your family. Yeah, I love it. Sort of, talked to Dino about it a number of months ago, and like, I'm glad I'm not on the committee that chooses it. Yeah. There's a criteria they've obviously put together, but the whole number of sharks there that

[00:26:12] you can't put everyone in, but it's, I think it's an awesome club event. It shows a care, it shows a respect for past. Yeah, we love honour and acknowledge in our history, and I think it shows, you know, obviously shows those players who did pave the way, like we're only here because they were here, and they've set up what they've set up in their, you know, we're, essentially we have a period of time where custodians of the jersey or the club for, however long that period is different for everyone.

[00:26:42] What you do in that time needs to be impactful, but the players that will get inducted, then their time was clearly a really impactful period of time for the sharks. So, I just feel like it's really important to honour that and acknowledge that. Now there's a full stop on that, I'm going to ask you a question off the top of my head. It's not related to Hall of Fame, but who are some of your favourites from years gone by as sharks? Probably a surprise of you, I actually had caught up with him the other day as a player when

[00:27:10] I was the ball boy, Dave Borton, his name is. Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, mates who bought out through surfing and lives down my way, but terrific man, and that guy's a savage. Good player, yeah. He was small, small little middle, probably Cam's size I reckon, when he was playing, but just the savage, just like head first, cut people in half, and then obviously being a young player, like the stars, you know, your ETs, and I think that 88 sort of crew had

[00:27:36] heaps, ETs, Sparkles, Docking, Al Wilson, like those sorts of guys were just, they were in their prime at that time. And yeah, I even remember Michael Speechley's tackling technique, like fans had probably resonated with that. I had to forget that one. Oh, I just, yeah, just chopping people's legs, so. Yeah. But I would suggest as a young kid, I don't really, I don't really ever think I put anyone

[00:28:03] on a pedestal other than, wow, like they're all amazing. Yeah. Like you just didn't, you know, like a kid just going, like how good's this being around here? So, it's hard to put anyone on a pedestal there, I think. Okay, good answer, good safe answer. I know that's not what you're doing, but it's a safe answer. Okay, so we're headed to America. We're headed to America in, I don't know, three or four weeks. How are you feeling? It's been a long time coming. There was will we, won't we, will we, won't we.

[00:28:30] Noxie's out there doing all sorts of road trips and I don't know what else he's doing, but how are you feeling now about Vegas? Well, I'm going to blame Noxie if it doesn't work, so it's great. We've had, and I'm not joking about this at all, we've had like death defying, horrible fires and nature, like all sorts of stuff's going on. Yeah, no, noxie, between Noxie and Moons, Dino, there's like a committee of getting that stuff logistically organized. They've done a terrific job to make sure it's going to be clear, well organized, well planned in advance.

[00:28:59] And, you know, with a unique experience like that, that the club wouldn't have been able to do, you know, with the NRL, I think it's a great game promotion, first of all. It's important for our game to be a part of it in its second year. I think it is very exciting. It comes with some, it does come with some pain, not everyone gets to go. So that'll be, it's going to be a tough week, I think. However, who wouldn't be excited about the opportunity?

[00:29:27] But the understanding is we're going there to do our job. It's, this is not a festival, a party festival for us going, yeah, the fans will. The fans will, the traveling crew that get over that experience, like a magic round in Vegas, right? Yeah. That's their festival. We have a job to do. So we want to go and socialize and connect in LA a little bit, you know, have some, have a unique experience that we wouldn't normally get. But all the while, when we get to Vegas, it's, it's head on. We've got a job to do.

[00:29:53] So is that, or is it going to be hard to get that into their young minds, young excitable minds? I don't think so based on the level of care for their footy I'm seeing at the moment. Would it be, is it possible they get distracted? I don't think every team will face the possibility of that. But I also think that they know we're going there for a job. We're playing Penrith. Like it's the four time premiers. Like I don't think that's not lost on the players either.

[00:30:23] They know that at the end of that week, you've got to get ready for that. So it's not like we're going there for some trial match or a loose preparation or get it done come game day. So I think they're aware of that. We'll raise that awareness clearly when we're there prior to going, when we're there and during the week, of course. So, but it's so exciting. Like, gosh, how grateful.

[00:30:45] We just, what a footy can offer so many opportunities and things that you don't see coming that fill you with joy. And, you know, but gratitude for us is we're so grateful that we get this. This is an opportunity for us, but it's also an opportunity to perform, not just have an experience. Yeah. I know you've spoken about the draw a little bit in your press, so I won't hammer you on

[00:31:11] that, but for listeners who haven't worked it out, the first half of the draw, we're kind of all over the shop. Yep. But the good news is the second half, I don't think we leave New South Wales. Right. Yeah. I don't even look at it. Honestly, I don't mean to be flippant with that response. I just, how do you know whether it's a good or a bad draw until the teams get playing? They do it every year to us. They say, you've got an easy draw. Yeah. No, we don't, because by the time we're playing the teams, they're outperforming where you predicted they would start and or finish.

[00:31:41] You don't know. Now, as far as travel goes, with our shortened pre-season, we haven't done a camp. We've got an opportunity to spend time together, like grow our connections and strength to play together. We've traveled pretty well in the last sort of two years. We've had a couple of hiccups traveling, but we enjoy it. We've actually gotten better at it and we're looking at it like great, like challenges. If it's external challenge, that's up to external challenges, whether we do or we don't have a good draw.

[00:32:10] We're only focused on what's in front of us and we've got a great opportunity to connect and play good footy. Well, I was going to say, and you beat me to it, that we do like to travel, so it's not a problem. Maybe there's one in my mind that blew out on the road last year. But generally speaking, I didn't watch the games and go, oh, we're in another state. We're going to roll over. But no, more to the point, we go to Vegas, we come home. Yep. We're going to Townsville. Like that's a pain in the butt. No one's going to deny that.

[00:32:40] But see, even that, I'm like, Vegas is round zero. Just focus, get that prepared, organize whatever, go and get your job done. And then we've got the week when we come back to go, righto, what's important for the next travel? Like we've chopped up that. We've obviously pre-booked, pre-planned on how we will, when we'll travel, when we'll train, et cetera. But we can't control the second week until we control the first one as well. And yeah, like if you look at the draw in its entirety, it's not ideal for the amount

[00:33:08] of travel we have, unless it is ideal because we want to travel. So I don't see a great deal of choice from us really. I do like that about your philosophies and your coaching from what I can tell. I know that some years in the threes you've been here, you've done it in blocks. It felt like last year probably due to circumstance, and maybe it's just my interpretation, you were doing week by week and that was it. You were shutting down everything. And I think that's the way to do it. Like as you said, you can only focus on what's just there. You're not worried about three weeks time.

[00:33:38] Is that something that you felt last year? I think the players need it. Like if you to look at, if I looked at that in a block of how much travel we have, well that's too much to prepare for. It's too much to take on. It's like, and we are prepared for it. Like staff, we do. The players need to know what's in front of them each week. And we don't know what team is going to present each week due to injury, suspension, form, et cetera.

[00:34:03] So playing it out each week does give you, or I feel like for our staff, it gives us a clearer. We do a big picture. Obviously, I think everyone, I don't think I'm saying any other NRL club wouldn't do, but I feel like because of the narrative around us, every time I was walking into a press conference, it was, you're about to play. Melbourne rest is better. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that block or chopping of blocks was getting fed to us.

[00:34:31] Like every time we do media, the players do media, post game, pre game, et cetera. So if you think about playing all four teams in a week, it's a big thing, but you can't. So the only thing left is what's the next one? What's the next challenge? And we've had a few of those. We had the, the so-called month of death the year before and on in 22, we had an unwinnable run. We've got a few little challenges there. Um, but it's, each season is different as well.

[00:35:00] Like some other teams will improve. Some might drop off. We, we might, we might get hit with a trouble. Are you getting it? Like you gotta be prepared for, for all of that, but I'll just, yeah, I think it's, and I'm not just making it up. So I feel that way. It's just how I feel. I'm looking forward to the first one. Let's get that done. And then the first one's a big challenge, you know, since day one, since before day one, you've often spoken about the group that was at Cronulla under Bomber Morris.

[00:35:27] And one of the reasons that the club was so attractive to you was this great bunch of juniors, so to speak. And you were always talking about when they get to a hundred games and they get to a hundred games and that's how you sometimes, I'm making up words here for you, but judge how a guy's going at a hundred games. You, you had this hundred game storyline from what I can tell. And we've been following that. And individually a bunch of our guys are reaching that milestone or very close to it and they're all lifting.

[00:35:54] And so another reason why I'm so impressed with what you do is that the things you kind of say will happen, happen. Now you're not promising the world, but you said once these guys kind of reach this milestone close to together, you'll notice it. And we saw that in the years gone. Like your Braley's, Ronaldo's, just Britton Nicker as those guys who've been here for three or four years. They're really starting to hit their peak form.

[00:36:22] And as a collective, that's only going to benefit us. But are you kind of pleased with how that's going? Yeah, I am. It's not so much the number 100, but it is, you, it's hard to make an assessment on what a player's capable of too early. Yeah. I think sometimes, sometimes the assessment puts too much expectation on a player too soon and then they suffer for that. And then vice versa. Some just take a little bit longer.

[00:36:50] You know, like a, God, a player I'd probably think of would be Isaiah Yeo. Like compare his first 100 games to his, he's just played 250, I think. Is that from Penrith? Yeah. Like my Lord, look at him now, you know, he's, he's, that guy's elite, you know. But he wasn't considered elite in that first zero to 100. So there's a, there's an example. And I know that goes the other way as well. Some guys in their first 20 go, this guy's a star. And then it's a, and some guys are stars in 20 and stay stars as well.

[00:37:19] So there's rules for different, there's an argument for both. But now what I felt was more, and I still feel this, it's some of it's painful because you're waiting under in the, if you've made an assessment of these players and we've, we've decided to try and keep everyone together. Well, you have to wear the pain of that if you're going to stick with them. So when it doesn't work out, you have to deal with, do I move one on? Do I not? Do I not flinch? Do I hold it? Now that's up to every club has a different view on that.

[00:37:47] Some are, and most clubs are pretty stable, I think. But with, I feel in the last sort of three years with the Americanized or soccer like trade window postseason, the news now, everything postseason is about who's going where, who's signing who, and it's big news. I guess fantasy league would have something to do with that. The super coach, et cetera. It's news and it's talking points and it's whatever.

[00:38:15] But that's also, traditionally, you've always tried to keep the same players, use the least amount of players for the most amount of time. And that's been a marker for winning. But now all of a sudden that's changed with the market and salary cap and players, you know, coming and going. So we just felt like we haven't got the best out of our players yet. So we want to keep them until we see that they can find new levels. And some can. Some, if you don't find a new level, but they're bloody consistent, then you're worth keeping

[00:38:44] them. So for a large portion of our squad, I don't think they've found what they're capable of just yet. But that's easy, really easy to say sitting here before a game when a ball's been kicked this year. I'll have to assess that as we go. Do I see improvement? Do we see consistency? Do we see decline? Like that's when you start assessing where they're at. But I haven't seen anything other than gradual improvement from them, for the most part.

[00:39:12] Sharks player of the year, Sharkars pod player of the year, Blake Braley, through best season. He's been on the upward trend for years. I'm a huge fan of what he does. Last year, he kind of proved it to the world, I thought. A lot more running, just a bit more versatility and attack. Do you see that continuing? Have you got any preconceived ideas about how you want him to play? How do you see Blake in 2025? If I went back to the last answer, he's bloody consistent.

[00:39:42] Yes. So his level is consistent. He doesn't miss a game. No, and he's got more levels. But the thing with Blake, which is, it's so easy to assess and go, like when he runs, something happens. Yeah. Right? But you can't just go, run every time. That's not, that's not going to, he's not going to work. Right? So do we want him to pick and choose when he runs and run more because he's so effective at it? Yeah, sure. We talked about that. I don't think that's a secret.

[00:40:11] How, when he runs is very particular to how we're playing. Now, when we are up and running and playing a good style of footy that we want to play, he runs more. Yeah. And if we're not, he runs less. So, yeah, basically individual, team success warrants individual success. And I think for Blake, the stronger our team's got, the better he's played. You know, I'd like to think that he's, even in our times we haven't played well, he's still played pretty consistently. Like pretty well. Very, at a good level. And do I think he's got more? Yeah. Yeah. All right.

[00:40:40] Let's briefly talk about one of the halves, Nico Hines. He's, everyone loves talking about him. You and I know he's a great human and great player. How's he looking in the off season? What's, what's going on with Nico? Yeah. Yeah, he's charging. He's, you know, obviously hampered back into last year, ankle training, hard to run, hard to prepare, but walked in the door. He's worked, trained really hard by himself in the off season. He's calm, he's clear, he's adjusted to the lessons of last year.

[00:41:10] And I think, you know, whether, I'm not sure the narrative after the Penrith game or whether, but he, you know, knew his place that he wasn't at his best when he come back in, complimented Tricky really well. And those guys as a combination of six and seven, they just haven't played enough together. Like we just haven't had enough time with those two guys next to each other for long periods of time. And we're looking forward to seeing that, you know, I think for Nico, you know, it is a lot of question.

[00:41:39] And the number is, there's something in the number. I've got to ask the other day, I said, the reality of the number is this. When Trindle wore seven and Atkinson wore six. Yeah. Right? Trindle plays a certain way. When Heinz come back in and Trindle wore six and Heinz wore seven, Trindle didn't play any different to how he played when he wore number seven. Their roles, whether they change numbers, won't change their roles. Yeah. But what we have to do as a club and a team is get their roles connected better and get them playing better together.

[00:42:07] Instead of one or the other, we want both. Yeah. Now, the number won't change the role. So, you know, and if it isn't a number, in three years of Nico Heinz being number seven for the Sharks, we've had two top four finishes. We finally won a final. Basically, you know, he had to support Trindle. Trindle delivered. Like that was a standout game, that Cowboys final. But so Heinz, we've had two top four finishes, semis each year,

[00:42:37] and he's played for New South Wales, played for Australia, won a Dalliem, runner up in the Dalliem, was leading the Dalliem until before the Origin hiccup. So, but he's had, which he's aware of, he's had, you know, probably half a dozen high profile games where it hasn't worked out. Yeah. And he's had to wear that in the responsibility of being the playmaker for a club. Yeah. You have to, that's part of the deal. Now, it's, he views it a little bit different now. He's like, yeah, you're right. That's what I've got to do. And that's what I've got to wear.

[00:43:06] If that's what I want to be, then, you know, it's actually, he's quite open-minded about it, accepts it. And away we go. But if I have to change the number because it is a thing, I will. But at the moment it's not. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Have you seen anyone under that sort of spotlight in your time in the game? Oh, I don't know because I don't look at it. Yeah. But I would say this. Or being around someone like that? No, because I would say there wouldn't be a presser that I would do before a game

[00:43:34] and after a game that doesn't start with him for most of the year. So that gives me an indication. I'm aware of it. Like the media managers obviously fill me in if stuff's out there and whatever. But I try, I feel like it influences the way I feel when I look at too much or read anything. So I try and steer away from it. I just ask the media manager what's happened this week. And then, so I've got a ducks in a row before doing a press conference. But most of the time before we do the pressers, I ask them, is this Nico? Or is that, have a laugh.

[00:44:03] But it's not bad. Like it's, it's, it's, he's done that in three years, got himself to such an illog position. Like it's like, it is what it is. Like he's, he's accepting of that. I think it's, if he's someone, the player, everyone's interested in or whatever, I don't think it's a bad thing. I think it'll end up being a strength of his if he can, you know, play his way through. I'm going to let you go real soon, Fitz. I want to finish with two lighter questions for you.

[00:44:31] I'm not going to ask you how much sleep you get per night. I'm going to ask you what's your preferred coffee order when you go to a cafe or at home? What, what sort of a coffee drinker are you? Uh, as long as it's strong and hot, I don't really care. I'm not a snob. I'd mad at work. I drink the cheap and nasty. Right. Instant Nescafe as long as it's strong. Are you a milk man? Are you a little guac man? Yeah, I have a little bit of milk. I'd go to a cafe, I'd probably get a double shot flat white, I guess. Something like that.

[00:45:00] Can you reveal how many you're having a day? Like, say, after, say, round three of the season, how many? Yeah, no, I don't really ever pay attention. I don't feel, I don't feel a buzz off it. I just like the flavour of it, to be honest. Okay. Yeah, probably two or three days. Okay. But I don't, yeah, I don't, I don't really drink it for the buzz. Nothing doesn't really buzz you like footy again, but I like the flavour. Okay. Last question. And I did prep you before we started. I wanted to talk to you about TV shows.

[00:45:30] And specifically, I was going to ask you about sporting themes in TV shows. And I brought up two, one of which you answered. So I've raised Friday Night Lights. Are you aware of what Friday Night Lights is? Like the show, the movie? Have you seen anything to do with Friday Night Lights? No, I haven't. No. Shame on you, Fitzy. We're going to have to sort that out. You would absolutely love it. Well, I'm looking for something to watch at the moment. Dude, we'll get you sorted. Okay. It's about a small town in Texas and their coach specifically. And you will love it. Critically acclaimed, the whole thing.

[00:46:00] You did tell me you watched Ted last summer. Yeah, I got bullied into that. It was just the staff were talking about it. It was driving me mad. So I was like, oh, look, do it. And one of my wife's friends was saying, she doesn't even really watch rugby. She's like, you got to watch it. You got to watch it. It's a sport. Yeah. I know it's not rugby league, but I was like, oh, all right. I'll just basically, by the time I do watch something at night, I can, mate, I'm five, I'm 10 minutes. I'm on the nod. Sure, sure, sure. Oh yeah.

[00:46:28] It took a long time to get through it, but I really enjoyed it. I'll tell you what I enjoyed it because I lived in England and played in England. So understanding the English, the humour, I really enjoyed that. And then, yeah, like the, what you don't see in a week to week prep is the joy, the humour, the fun. Yeah. The experiences you get behind closed doors. I thought Ted Lasso did such a good job of showing you moments of that. Okay. And also, stark reminded, just get off yourself.

[00:46:57] Like don't take yourself too serious sometimes. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah, you get it. So I thought he did that really well. Yeah. Yeah. No, not, you know, not tactically or anything like that, but there was a couple of attitude moments and lessons that he treated players certain ways for different reasons that principally speaking, we haven't faced the same situation, but the principles he applied with said player. Yeah. We've yeah. There's some stuff in that for sure. Okay.

[00:47:25] I need to get you to watch Friday Night Lights. Okay. I really think you'd like it. Righto. Will do. Do you like American football a little? Uh, I'm getting more the, some of the staff like Josh and some of the DJ, they probably less so, but they, um, they talk about a lot. It's been on a little bit in the background. I know a lot of the players, Mark, Mark Learbrough is the analyst. He's in the fantasy competition with some of the boys. So I have taken more of an interest based on watching other documentaries, like obviously the Brady one. Yep.

[00:47:55] I watched a Barry Sanders one the other day. That's pretty cool. Okay. So more historical ones. Okay. Um, the bills series and bullies of Baltimore. And so whilst I'm not really savvy on the mechanics of the game, I do have an appreciation for the end of the day. It's high stakes. It's professional sport entertainment. There's the risk, the threat of the amount of money that goes on the line. And yeah, so I'll watch it. All right. Cool. Cool. Hey, thanks for catching up with us. Really appreciate it.

[00:48:21] Uh, best of luck for the season and, uh, anything you want to say to the fans, listeners, anything at all? Put you on the spot. I mean, I feel the wave of optimisms and constant support. It's a very real energy and it can become momentum quickly. Um, as opposed to, you know, I think, and I do it every, fans have the right. They want to see a team act a certain way, play a certain way and whatever. But geez, when we feel that energy of total support and, and, you know, it becomes, becomes

[00:48:51] momentum we can use. And we do appreciate it. The other day we did a signing session, uh, here, the weather, we had to change the members day, the fan day. There must've been a thousand people here just come through and in horrible conditions. Just to say, we haven't had that, uh, that many people turn up. It was great. It was like just a sign of the support we are getting. And yeah, hopefully we're, we've got to deliver for them too. You know, we've got to, we've got to be believable. We've got to give them something to cheer for. We've got to, we are, we are talking about, we want to make the community proud as well. So yeah.

[00:49:21] I think you've been doing it personally. The fans can, and our listeners hear me say this every week, the fans can be a bit intense. You know, I probably get tens to hundreds of correspondence every week, especially when we lose by a point with a minute to go, whatever it's doomsday stuff. And I completely appreciate that feeling. I've had that feeling before. I don't really get it anymore, but I understand that feeling. Yep. But three final series in a row, Daly and players 20 minutes from a grand final.

[00:49:51] Like things are okay. In my opinion, it doesn't mean they can't be better. We hope they will be better. Yeah. Yeah. Our intention is to have that, that they don't have to feel that. They don't have to experience that. And the reality of the sport is it happens from time to time, but we are. And I do, I do feel that our, I felt most of our fans are pretty respectful. Now again, I'm not online. I'm not getting, I do get some, uh, some handwritten letters and get a bit of venom, you know, but

[00:50:19] no one's ever sending it to me in person, but also get it. It's the life of a fan. They're frustrated. They pay their money. They want to come and watch. However, there's, there's a line across, be a passionate fan that wants to cheer and feel disappointed. And I'm like, that's great. But there's a line you can cross. If it goes too far, then it goes too far. But for the most part, I think we are, we've offered enough, um, enough hope and enjoyment to keep it largely heading in the right direction. And we'd like to give them even more, but it's, um, it's plenty of challenges that come ahead.

[00:50:49] So we need to be ready for everything, but we'd like to, we'd like to fill the community up and get them smiling. That's for sure. All right. Well, you got me smiling. Appreciate it. And, uh, again, thank you so much for your time. Craig Fitzgibbon. No worries. Thanks, Sam. Talk. Shark Cast is supported by the best and most honest real estate agent in the Sutherland Shire, Jason Hawes from Crips and Crips Real Estate. He's an expert in the Carring Bar region and has his eye all across the Shire. Lifelong Sharks fan and supporter of this podcast.

[00:51:18] If you're looking to buy or sell in the region, the person you need to be talking to is Jason Hawes from Crips and Crips Real Estate. Call him on 0410 417 450. That's 0410 417 450. That's 0410 417 450. Jason Hawes, Crips and Crips Real Estate. Sharks. Sharks. Sharks.

[00:51:52] And to all you people back in the Shire, turn your porch lights off because we're coming over the truck.