If he worked at NASA, Dan McKellar might say: “Houston, we’ve had a problem …”.
Instead, McKellar works at the NSW Waratahs and plans on fixing the problem after firing a rocket up the Super Rugby Pacific underachievers in an explosive postscript to Friday night’s 48-33 surrender to the Crusaders.
Livid at watching his side leak five tries before halftime en route to a fourth straight defeat, McKellar accused his charges of lacking commitment and declared the entire franchise needed a cultural overhaul.
“There are some people who are too comfortable. That needs to change. If you’re too comfortable, just happy to be here and wear the tracksuit, that will change,” the coach blasted.
“It’s definitely not an ability thing. There’s no way it’s an ability thing.
“I’ve been here a while now, a number of months now, and there’s some things that are going to take time to change.
“We showed some fight in the second half, but you can’t get to 33-7 at halftime and get a spray from the coach to then get a reaction.
“This is a professional game. We’ve got to be like that from the very first minute.
“I’ve got to figure it out. People need to buy into the change. Otherwise, we’ll change other things.”
Points Flow Chart
Crusaders win +15
Time in lead
44%
Possession Last 10 min
56%
Insisting he could never be known as ‘Mr Nice Guy’, McKellar promised a “brutal” review of the entire club.
“It’s the whole organisation,” he said.
“So, when did we start, October 28? I’ve observed, learned a lot of good things, and you’ve got to want to do it day in, day out. Week in, week out, and a lot of guys are doing that.
“There’s a few that aren’t.
“It’s in daily habits. If we look at the Waratahs as a whole over the last few years, there’s things that need to change.
“But it’s more than just a weekly thing here. It’s changes that we need to make that will set the organisation and the group up for years to come – and that’s on me.”
Equally fed-up captain Jake Gordon wholeheartedly agrees.
“Results speak for themselves. There have been systemic issues for a bit of time now,” Gordon said.
“I’ve spoken to Dan about this before. There’s been issues for a while and that takes time to change.
“It’s just disappointing. This is the worst because we’re a better team than that.
“We just need to worry more about playing and not talking s**t.
“We had a plan to put the Crusaders under pressure from kick off, which we didn’t until the first kick off of the second half.”
The Waratahs remain anchored to eighth spot, five points adrift of the top-six, and needing a miracle to make the finals even with victories in their last two regular-season games against the Western Force in Perth and Blues in Auckland.
“We just want to front up Monday and train well and do that Tuesday and have a good week of prep and then go over to Perth and try to win our first game as a group together away from home, and what will be will be,” McKellar said.
“We haven’t been too fixated on the ladder and that sort of thing. We knew destiny was in our own hands.
“But it’s probably not the case now.”
