{"id":621992,"date":"2026-04-21T19:17:43","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T19:17:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/621992\/"},"modified":"2026-04-21T19:17:43","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T19:17:43","slug":"dean-young-first-press-conference-as-dragons-coach-kyle-flanagan-dropped-kade-reed-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/621992\/","title":{"rendered":"Dean Young first press conference as Dragons coach, Kyle Flanagan dropped, Kade Reed debut"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dean Young claimed Shane Flanagan told him he\u2019d \u201chad enough\u201d as the new Dragons interim head coach opened up on a whirlwind 24 hours<\/a> and his future plans for the club. <\/p>\n

Watch every game of every round of the NRL Premiership LIVE with no ad-breaks during play on FOX LEAGUE, available on Kayo Sports | New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\n

Young was appointed to the role on Monday afternoon and did not take long to put his stamp on the team, even if he didn\u2019t necessarily agree with framing it that way. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need change,\u201d he instead told reporters.<\/p>\n

That started with dropping Kyle Flanagan to the bench<\/a>, where he will now serve as cover for both the halves and hooker Damien Cook with Jacob Liddle unavailable. <\/p>\n

In Flanagan\u2019s place is teenage halfback Kade Reed, who makes his long-awaited NRL debut albeit in less than ideal circumstances for the 0-7 Dragons.<\/p>\n

When Young was told at 5.30pm on Monday that he would be taking over as Dragons coach for the remainder of the year, he set about doing three things.<\/p>\n

First, he went home and told his wife to \u201cbuckle up\u201d. Then, he apologised to his three kids about \u201cwhat is going to happen next\u201d and finally, he drove over to Reed\u2019s house for what is the \u201cbest part of coaching\u201d.<\/p>\n

Young could have done it over the phone, but he wanted to explain to Reed\u2019s parents in person that he was not throwing their son in the deep end. <\/p>\n

Reed \u201cwill not be the saviour of this club\u201d, as Young warned.<\/p>\n

Get all the latest NRL news, highlights and analysis delivered straight to your inbox with Fox Sports Sportmail. Sign up now!!!<\/a><\/p>\n

Young explains change for Kyle Flanagan | 01:33<\/p>\n

\u201cHe needs the 16 players that take the field on the weekend to do their job and then he\u2019ll be able to do his,\u201d Young added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought it was important that his parents understood the reason why I\u2019m giving him the opportunity. People will probably judge my decision and say that we\u2019re zero and seven and chucking in a kid on debut on Anzac Day is risky. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut I wouldn\u2019t do it unless I believed in him and I wanted him to know that I believe in him and that his parents fully knew that I\u2019m in there for the long haul with him and he\u2019s a big part of the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Young said he has his own \u201copinions of why we\u2019re in the position that we\u2019re at\u201d but added he would wait until after their Round 9 bye to \u201cdo things the way I want to do them\u201d. <\/p>\n

The Dragons premiership winner could sense Flanagan\u2019s position as head coach may have been in jeopardy. After all, he\u2019s been in the NRL since 2003.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I could see that things weren\u2019t going the way that we all wanted to go,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen that happens for a long period of time, clubs make change. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was prepared for whatever happened, but I was in there fighting as hard as I could with Shane until the end.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultimately, Young said that Flanagan told him after the loss to the Rabbitohs that \u201che\u2019s had enough\u201d.<\/p>\n

MORE NRL NEWS<\/p>\n

BURNING Qs: Dominoes to fall after Flanno axing; ugly recruitment truth laid bare<\/a><\/p>\n

CRAWLEY: Why Flanno replacement is playing dangerous game<\/a><\/p>\n

Dean Young opened up on a dramatic 24 hours.Source: FOX SPORTS<\/p>\n

Flanagan was not the only one to lose his job, with head of football Ben Haran also stepping down while Young also spoke about the \u201chard\u201d decision to let go of assistant Michael Ennis<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat one was hard, mate, to be honest,\u201d Young said. <\/p>\n

\u201cAs I said, the best part of coaching is giving kids their debut and the toughest part of the job is telling people that there\u2019s no job here for them. I\u2019ve known Mick for a long time. I played with him back in 2005. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got a good relationship with him and unfortunately he\u2019s part of the change. We need a circuit breaker. We need things to look different. We need things to feel different. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got nothing against him as a coach. I think potentially he could be a good head coach down the track, but for me I need different voices. I need a playing group to feel different.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dean Young claimed Shane Flanagan told him he\u2019d \u201chad enough\u201d as the new Dragons interim head coach opened…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":621993,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-621992","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\/621992","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=621992"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621992\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/621993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=621992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=621992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=621992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}