Five ways Kieran Foran has improved Manly after five games

The plan was to head to Brookvale Oval and talk to enough Manly players to fill out a list of five ways caretaker coach Kieran Foran has turned the club around so dramatically in the last six weeks.

Jake Trbojevic, in typical Jake Trbojevic fashion, took matters into his own hands.

“Forget one example, I’ll give you the five now,” Trbojevic told this masthead.

“One, ‘Foz’ was the ultimate competitor as a player, and that competitiveness has rubbed off on the group. The bloke wants to win, and you can feel it.

“Secondly, he’s got passion, which resonates with me. He knows the club, loves the club, and the community loves him.

“He drives standards, and lets us know what he wants from us before every training session and every game.

“How many examples is that?”

That’s three, Jake.

“The fourth point is Foz is big on fun,” Trbojevic continued. “If we have a short turnaround, we’ll have one main session and get to work. If there’s a longer turnaround, he’ll mix it up with games and makes it ‘footy fun’.

“And finally, he’s got respect. The bloke walks into the room and he owns it. It’s Kieran Foran. You want motivation, just look at him. The bloke is 35 years old, but he’s already lived 50 lives.”

When you think of the feelgood stories that have already unfolded in the NRL this season, Foran’s is the first that springs to mind. He took over Manly following Anthony Seibold’s sacking three rounds into the season, won his first four games, then inspired Manly to push premiership favourites Penrith all the way last Sunday. With a touch more composure, Manly could have been five from five.

Foran is quick to point out the club has done nothing yet, and the finals are still a long way off.

But if Manly get the job done at home to Brisbane on Saturday night, and again against the Wests Tigers at Magic Round, you have to wonder how much longer the club and owner Scott Penn can stall on giving Foran, a 2011 premiership winner, the job full-time.

Trbojevic wants it known who he is rooting for.

“I understand coaches need experience, but if you look at young players, if they are given an opportunity and do a good job, they stay there,” he said.

“They develop and get better. Why can’t a young coach do the same thing? Foz is doing a great job now, and we might not see the best version of him as a coach for another five or ten years.

“Whether you like it or not, Manly and the community love having a Manly person lead the Sea Eagles. It’s just a thing. It’s a no-brainer he gets the full-time job for me.”

On the field, Foran has the Sea Eagles playing more direct. He wants them to run hard, play to their strengths, and “earn” everything.

Back-rower Haumole Olakau’atu has been at his rampaging best on the right edge, and said of Foran’s influence: “He’s given me belief and confidence to back myself and perform the way I have the past month.

“Another big thing for me is how much he cares about me and everyone in the team. He is always checking up on us and seeing how we are, and asking what we got up to on our days off.”

Foran said he would never ask the players to do anything he was never prepared to do on the field.

“I just want them to back themselves and believe what they’re capable of,” Foran said this week. “I also want to help them to grow each week. The biggest thing I took out of my career was to look for incremental improvements every game; I’m asking the guys to be professional, have high standards, and to basically steer the ship.

“This is their team. They own it, you take control of it, you develop it, you grow it, and together we can all achieve something special. That’s really been my approach to it all.”

Foran knows he is young enough to relate to the players, but wise enough to help them off the field, especially given his well-publicised struggles with mental health, the torment of injury setbacks, and the loss of his stepson a few years ago.

“I was a lad’s lad for the majority of my career, but if you look at the experiences and tragedies and what I’ve gone through in my life, even at 35, you can understand where I sit in terms of maturity,” Foran said. “People always referred to me as an old soul – I always had an old head on young shoulders.

“If anything, I see that as an upside because I’m in a space where I can connect with them closely on a deep emotional level. But I can also be hard on them – I was always hard on the players around me and what my expectations were of them, and it’s no different as a coach.”