“You can complain or you can compete—but you cannot do both at the same time—the choice is yours.”

For Michael Maguire, that isn’t a locker-room slogan; that is Madge.

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I lived it firsthand rooming with him as an assistant at the Raiders in 2024.

You’d wake at 2:00 AM to a pitch-black room, save for the ghostly blue glow of a laptop. There’s Madge, eyes like saucers, deep into his twelfth hour of game vision. He’d look over with a casual, “Hey Pal, how you doing?”—as if grinding through ruck-speed in the dead of night was the only logical way for a human being to exist.

By the time the rest of the world hit the snooze button at 7:00 AM, Madge was already on his second workday.

He’d sweated through a gym session and was sitting at the breakfast table, laptop open next to the eggs, flagging down players to dissect a three-second clip of a transition error. It was 24/7, red-lined enthusiasm. If I could have found the power source to his brain, I would have yanked it just for a moment of peace.

But that unyielding energy is why the “bagging” happened in the first place. Madge is like that crazy dog who won’t stop dropping the ball at your feet; eventually, the family starts talking about moving him on just to get some rest.

For the first half of 2025, the Broncos were that family. The media sharpened their knives as a “rockstar” roster bristled under the relentless demand of a coach who simply wouldn’t go away.

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Michael Maguire’s work ethic is second to none. Picture: Nigel HallettSource: News Corp Australia

Then, the family settled in. They realized that by “going inside” and locking the external door, they found a strange security in his obsession. As Adam Reynolds noted: “His work ethic and the standards that he sets… are quite unbelievable. You saw how fit we were at the back end of games. All that is due to Madge.”

It is a quote that should be etched into the minds of every player at Red Hill. Respect in this game is ironclad only when it’s forged in the grind, and Reynolds knew that those “saucer eyes” were the only map to a trophy.

Mam lauds Reynolds’ early impact | 01:22

By the time the siren sounded on a 26-22 Grand Final win over Melbourne, the 19-year drought wasn’t just broken—it was scorched.

But now, the noise has started again.

Becoming a champion is hard work, but staying there is a different beast. When the house is quiet and the off-season adrenaline fades, the thought of doing all that work again—climbing that mountain with a target on your back—can visit a player late at night.

But for that Bronco player having a whinge, whatever you do, don’t look across the room. Madge is already there, the blue light of the laptop reflecting off his eyes. He’s already on Day 2 of the title defence, and he’s waiting to ask: “Hey Pal, how you doing?”

Michael Crawley has worked as an assistant coach at the Raiders, Knights and Cowboys as well as a coaching consultant with the Dragons.