{"id":595074,"date":"2026-04-09T06:31:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T06:31:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/595074\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T06:31:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T06:31:14","slug":"st-george-illawarra-dragons-shane-flanagan-fights-for-his-coaching-future-in-manly-sea-eagles-clash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/595074\/","title":{"rendered":"St George Illawarra Dragons\u2019 Shane Flanagan fights for his coaching future in Manly Sea Eagles clash"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"DanSave<\/p>\n

You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n

Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n

Save this article for later<\/p>\n

Add articles to your saved list and come back to them anytime.<\/p>\n

Got it<\/p>\n

AAA<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t worry about Shane Flanagan, he\u2019ll get through it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if he\u2019s talking in third person. As the latest NRL coach in the gun, and the latest to try and lift the Dragons out of a mire that stretches back to the Wayne Bennett days, Flanagan dug in once more on Thursday morning in Wollongong.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s blood in the water,\u201d he quipped before an 11-minute press conference, noting the influx of Sydney media who typically don\u2019t make the trip south for the coach\u2019s media commitments.<\/p>\n

In a world of stretched newsrooms and dwindling resources, coupled with the Dragons\u2019 decade-long decline, typically, the trip is rarely worth the squeeze for rugby league journos.<\/p>\n

With nine straight losses, a must-win clash against Manly on Friday and publicly at least, radio silence from St George Illawarra powerbrokers<\/a> on their coach\u2019s future, Flanagan was resolute as usual.<\/p>\n

And in far better shape than the shattered man who fronted the cameras and recorders<\/a> after Dragons faithful booed last Saturday\u2019s 32-0 loss to the Cowboys.<\/p>\n

\"FeelingFeeling the heat: Dragons coach Shane Flanagan.NRL Imagery<\/p>\n

But an air of inevitability hangs. And not just around Flanagan\u2019s future, despite a two-year extension<\/a> signed off by the club last August.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the NRL. If you don\u2019t win [scrutiny] is going to come,\u201d Flanagan said. Anthony Seibold (who Flanagan was assistant to before taking the Dragons job) was speared by Manly all of 14 days ago<\/a>. Until three subsequent wins, North Queensland\u2019s Todd Payten had been most likely to fall first in 2026.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t believe, to be honest, the way we attack each other in this great game of ours,\u201d Flanagan said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the game. I love the people that I\u2019ve met through it. I love the players that I\u2019ve coached. I understand it, but I don\u2019t enjoy it and I don\u2019t encourage what\u2019s going on.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t wish what\u2019s going on with me in the last couple of weeks to anyone. That\u2019s the way it is. I can\u2019t change that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Flanagan is, of course, paid handsomely to wear the scrutiny, as are most of his underperforming players.<\/p>\n

He still has a contract and despite understandably not having the answers immediately after last Saturday\u2019s insipid performance, he still believes. So he will keep punching against the tide.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not worried about my future,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Though \u201cyou can imagine what the feedback\u2019s been\u201d in conversations with chairman Andrew Lancaster and CEO Tim Watsford.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got more important things to worry about. At this stage of my career, I\u2019ve got to worry about the club. I\u2019m not worried about me. And if I do that, if I do the job and we get through it, that\u2019s great. And if we don\u2019t, we\u2019ll walk away and just say that I tried my best.\u201d<\/p>\n

Would you walk away?<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, I\u2019m here to do a job and I still feel I\u2019m the best person for it. So I\u2019ll just keep battling on. I\u2019ve [coached rugby league] for 20 years, so I think I can do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the questions kept coming, old ground, inevitably, was covered once more.<\/p>\n

\"ShaneShane and Kyle Flanagan.NRL Photos<\/p>\n

Kyle Flanagan isn\u2019t returning from a heavy concussion<\/a> at halfback \u201cjust because of his surname\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s in our top three or four players competitive wise, week in, week out. So he\u2019s our best halfback in the club at the moment. So we pick him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Flanagan would have to answer to wife Cathie if Kyle wasn\u2019t completely fit to play by the way.<\/p>\n

The state of the Dragons roster<\/a> – \u201chave you got it wrong?\u201d – was answered with a sidestep that said plenty, and pointed, as Flanagan has more than once, to the long-term impacts of Ben Hunt<\/a>, Zac Lomax<\/a> and Francis Molo<\/a> falling out and leaving the club.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The Dragons have paused all extension talks given the coaching uncertainty.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd if I\u2019m a player, it\u2019s probably not a good time to be coming and asking for anything as well,\u201d Flanagan noted. \u201cIt\u2019s not, \u2018We don\u2019t want the players\u2019 or we\u2019re moving on from those players. It\u2019s just, \u2018Let\u2019s just concentrate on football\u2019, because we need to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Related Article\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

Tyrell Sloan gets a start at fullback due to Clint Gutherson\u2019s hamstring injury, winger Setu Tu replaces the suspended David Fale and Daniel Atkinson shifts to five-eighth on Friday night.<\/p>\n

Mostly forced rather than wholesale changes to a team that has forgotten how to win.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was one or two [more selection calls] I was considering, but I put a lot of faith in some of those boys that have played the last couple of weeks,\u201d Flanagan said. \u201cI\u2019m not saying this is their last opportunity, but they\u2019ve been given an opportunity to turn it around and hopefully that happens.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for how many more Flanagan gets, with all that \u201cblood in the water\u201d? Unfortunately, it all feels a bit inevitable.<\/p>\n

Save<\/p>\n

You have reached your maximum number of saved items.<\/p>\n

Remove items from your saved list<\/a> to add more.<\/p>\n

\"DanDan Walsh<\/a> is a sports reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via X<\/a> or email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":595075,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-595074","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nrl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-national-rugby-league","11":"tag-nationalrugbyleague","12":"tag-nrl","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=595074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/595075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=595074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=595074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=595074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}