Kieran Foran was all smiles after one of the most turbulent weeks in his career ended with Manly thrashing the Dolphins 52-18 in his first game since taking over from Anthony Seibold.
However, it wasn’t as easy as it looked after taking the reins of the club he made his name for as a player following the sacking of Seibold after four rounds.
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“It was whirlwind week, it was crazy, but that was an awesome effort, the boys were outstanding,” Foran said.
However, Foran felt a performance like that wasn’t far away despite their horror start to the season and paid tribute to the players for owning the result.
“I felt like that performance was coming,” Foran said.
“We’ve showed glimpses of that. We’ve been really, really good in patches. But the challenge for them this week was putting in a complete performance and doing it for longer periods. “And I just thought the week was great. The boys were outstanding. Obviously it was a huge week. There was a lot going on. You can’t take away from that, but they turned up tonight.”
There was no better player than second-rower Haumole Olakau’atu, who ran for 250 metres to go with two linebreaks, two try assists and a try in the nine tries to three rout.
“He was brilliant, he showed glimpses in the early rounds of what he’s capable of, but he hasn’t been doing it for long periods, but we saw it tonight,” Foran said.
“You just saw what he’s capable of when he’s in the contest from the get-go and I think he set the tone early and he challenged the Dolphins defensive line all night.”
Manly skipper Tom Trbojevic revealed Foran and CEO Jason King told the players to look in the mirror and work out how to help the club, which was the catalyst for the turnaround.
“You look at the week and just how we started this year, it was really disappointing,” Trbojevic said.
“And I think we came together and Foz and Kingy they really challenged us to have a good hard look at yourself and how you’ve contributed to where we are.
“Two of our greatest players, and to hear that from them, you realise you’ve got to have a good look at yourself and see how you can help and how you can contribute to a better football team.
“And I felt the way that everyone responded to that was excellent, so really pleased.”
Despite the resounding victory, Foran still lamented Manly’s inability to play for 80 minutes.
“They are a helluva footy team,” Foran said.
“There’s a great footy team in there and we know that. It just hasn’t been clicking. But we’ve got a footy team there. It’s just a matter of building on that. That’s a building block.
“We haven’t started the year the way that we would have wanted, but that performance tonight was a step in the right direction. That’s not the end result.
“52 points was nice, but we finished again poorly. We let in 18 points at the end of the game, but for 67 minutes we were outstanding.”
The rookie coach admitted nerves played a huge role in the lead-up to the game, which saw him go walkabout in Brisbane.
“I was nervous throughout the day,” Foran said.
“I was going for walks around Brisbane. I couldn’t sit still. I think I did about four or five kilometres.”
“He’s nervous at the best of the times this bloke,” Trbojevic interjected.
Foran continued: “But naturally nerves, right? Like you step into this role, and there’s been a lot going on through the week.
“I just wanted it for the club. Like I wanted the win tonight for the boys and for the club. It’s been a disappointing start to the season and we all knew that, but they deserve that tonight. “They’ve worked their backsides off all pre-season, and we’ve seen in the four walls how hard they’ve worked and the commitment that they’ve shown from the day that they walked through for pre-season.
“They have poured everything into it, and they deserve that tonight. They just went after it, and that’s all you can ask.”
Manly played with a much more simple formula, which seemed to work against the Dolphins, but Foran deflected praise on his players.
“That’s all the boys, that’s on the players,” Foran said.
“They took accountability for where things were at, and they decided to front up and go to work and that’s all we’ve asked of them to do is have a look at themselves in the mirror and turn up and put some pride back in the jersey and they did that tonight.”
Originally published as ‘That was coming’: Kieran Foran heaps praise on Manly players after ‘look in the mirror’ ultimatum
