Working hard to get things right

Hello to all our fans and supporters. Welcome to this week’s Coach’s Corner where I share issues and challenges in our official newspaper – The National.
Many good suggestions and criticisms are coming through the Hunters Forum and I value them. They reflect what the general public thinks and it’s good for the players and staff to read these comments.
Discipline is and will continue to be an issue. The off-field attitude and behaviour can be reflected on field. It affects teamwork – both on and off the field. And tough decisions to tear up a contract have to be made. These decisions are made in consultation with my coaching staff and recommended to the SP Hunters board.
And personally I lose sleep over some of these decisions in particular what happened this week when two players had to be told to leave. They become victims of their own actions. I think of their families and how they will cope. They let them down, they let the sponsors down. And they let themselves down.
I’ve said in previous columns that my main aim as a coach is not only to make these men better players, but nurture them to be great people. This culture of poor off field attitudes and behaviours must be corrected from a young age. When they come through the juniors and become adults, clubs must adopt these hard policies and apply them.
They’re already at a professional level where all eyes are on them. They become role models which kids aspires to be. Today’s senior players had their heroes when they were young. And the cycle continues.
We got thrashed (56-4) by the Bears last week. It was a disappointing performance. The game showed the difference in skills the opposition had to the skills and systems our players come through. We’ll keep working hard and keep believing in our systems.
Luke Page put in a great performance for the Bears. We spoke after the game and he said he wants to be part of the Kumuls team for the June Pacific Test. He knew everybody was watching back home and he lifted. Kumul coaching staff Marcus Bai and John Wilshire were also at the game and liked what they saw from Luke.
On Sunday we take on another quality side, Townsville Blackhawks. We’ll play for the Air Niugini Kokoda Cup introduced in 2017. This is to commemorate the Battle of Kokoda and the inaugural Air Niuginu flight to Townsville in 2017.
The cup is played at Hunters home games and we have won it over the past two years and defend it on Sunday.
Blackhawks entered the Intrust Super Cup in 2015, a year after us. Our record against them is eight games for six wins (four at home) and two losses (away). Our home record and support should motivate the team to do well and turn things around.
Kyle Laybutt will play for the Blackhawks and no doubt he’ll be out to put in an impressive performance in the halves and vie for a Kumuls jumper for the Pacific Test.
I’m sure that passion to wear the red, black and gold and play well in front of the Port Moresby crowd at NFS and TV viewers around the country will be his motivation.
The Digicel Cup competition enters Round 5 this weekend. Congratulations to the teams that won last week. Most scores are close which shows the standard of play is improving.
I’ve reviewed each weekend’s games since the first round and after this weekend, I’ll talk with PNG National Rugby League Competition manager Stanley Hondina on some of the technical areas teams and need to work on. We’ll compile a report with statistics and give to the coaches so they can address these areas.
Finally, congratulations to Brendon Gotuno on graduating with a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology minoring in Human Resources from UPNG.
Also, well done to our PNG Barramundis on their ODI success and the HB trio of Steven Kari, Morea Baru and Dika Toua on another golden performance. This shows that sacrifice, hard work and perseverance pays off.
Until next week, play safe, play fair and play hard in whatever sport you are taking part in.
And keep sending your views and comments and/or any questions related to this column to [email protected]

Cheers Mikez