![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/poster-fallback.png\"\/)
<\/p>\n
Despite having several promising players come through the ranks, such as Kade Reed, Jacob Halangahu, Dylan Egan, Hamish Stewart and the Couchman brothers, they are still paying big money to players at the back end of their careers, and their age is starting to show.<\/p>\n
This includes Damien Cook ($600K), Clinton Gutherson ($800K), Blake Lawrie ($600K), Luciano Leilua ($775K) and centre Valentine Holmes, who is commanding over $1 million per season until the end of 2027.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think if he\u2019s [Shane Flanagan] got to go, there should be a queue behind him. There has to be a queue, it just can\u2019t be him and (GM of Football) Ben Haran and it starts with some of the players,\u201d Code Sports\u2019 Dean Ritchie said on NRL 360.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe bodyguard\u2019s now gone. There\u2019s no layer between Flanagan, the media and the fans. It\u2019s about time some of those blokes in that dressing room manned up and started to show the fact that it means something to them.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Red V, the famous Red V. It means nothing to these blokes. It\u2019s about time they pulled their finger out.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve brought nothing to the table this year. Shane Flanagan\u2019s gone and ultimately he had to go but some of those senior players on big money they have not stood up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Braith: “Have some balls!” | 01:41<\/p>\n
Ritchie singled out Valentine Holmes, who has had a lethargic start to the 2026 season.<\/p>\n
Despite representing the Australian Kangaroos and Queensland Maroons during the prime of his career, Holmes has struggled during this year\u2019s campaign and had an absolute shocker against the South Sydney Rabbitohs last week. <\/p>\n
The incumbent Maroons centre produced some terrible defensive reads, which allowed opposing centre Latrell Mitchell to score four tries.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd let\u2019s start with the centre Val Holmes. That was embarrassing last weekend. That was embarrassing, some of his defensive efforts,\u201d Ritchie added.<\/p>\n
Code Sports journalist Brent Read continued, \u201cVal\u2019s been diabolical really all year, let\u2019s be brutally honest about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can see they weren\u2019t really having a go, you would suggest for the coach and that\u2019s the way it looked over the last few weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n
Set to face the Sydney Roosters on Saturday afternoon in the annual ANZAC Day clash, Ritchie has called for the million-dollar player to be dropped as Dean Young prepares for his first match as interim head coach since taking over from Shane Flanagan.<\/p>\n
\u201cI couldn\u2019t pick Val Holmes, I\u2019m sorry,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a State of Origin player. He\u2019s a gun, he\u2019s a star, but I can\u2019t pick Val Holmes based on his effort last week. It\u2019s just not on.\u201d\ufeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The St George Illawarra Dragons may have parted ways with head coach Shane Flanagan and GM of Football…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":619034,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-619033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619033","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=619033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/619034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=619033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=619033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=619033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}