Dean Young Dragons appointment: St George Illawarra great was unsure about taking coaching job – but then he went hard-core
Opinion
Dean Young wasn’t sure.
The Dragons roster is so poor, taking over as interim coach could be fatal for his burning ambition to be an NRL head coach.
Everything Young, a Dragons 2010 premiership hero, has done since the end of his playing career has been geared around coaching at the highest level.
He began with Illawarra’s SG Ball side in 2013, graduating to the Dragons under-20s in 2014, co-coaching with Ben Hornby.
By the 2015 season he was an assistant to Paul McGregor for the Dragons NRL team.
To break the shackles of his beloved club and further advance his coaching aspirations, he headed to the Cowboys as an assistant for three seasons under Todd Payten.
He returned to St George-Illawarra in 2024 when asked by the now axed Shane Flanagan.
Coaching the Dragons in the NRL would fulfil the ambition he has harboured since he turned his mind to coaching late in his playing career.
But getting there this way – by accepting the role as an interim for the remaining 17 matches of this season – is fraught with danger. He stewed over it.
The negatives are many. The team is not good enough to compete. He knows it. The club knows it.
Flanagan knew it too when he infamously declared his team could not win the competition ahead of their first match of the season against the Bulldogs in Las Vegas.
After losing seven straight matches, more sustained losses under Young would open the door for the board to look elsewhere.
The board members are under as much pressure as anyone at the club. Every move they make will be heavily scrutinised, especially after chairman Andrew Lancaster fired barbs at the media in his press conference announcing Flanagan was gone.
With Flanagan, football manager Ben Haran and assistant coach Michael Ennis now out, the pressure that was on them will be redirected to others at the club by fans wanting answers and success.
Young’s appointment was days in the making. Dragons officials began contacting prospective interim coaches late last week ahead of the loss to the Rabbitohs. One such approach was made to Mark “Piggy” Riddell, who didn’t entertain it because of his close friendship with Young.
He eventually indicated he would do the role, only if Young was out of the reckoning.
Through the weekend, Young did not know if he wanted the interim role, mindful his coaching aspirations could bite the dust by taking charge of a sunken ship.
By Monday, he’d steeled himself and decided he would do it.
And when he made that decision, he went hardcore. His first move was to drive to 20-year-old halfback Kade Reed’s family home on Monday night to inform the youngster and his parents he would be playing in the No.7 jersey against the Roosters on Anzac Day. Quite the debut for a kid Flanagan would not pick because of his age, preferring son Kyle in the role.
Young then informed Kyle he was dropped. The next agenda item came Tuesday morning when he informed Ennis he was out as assistant coach.
A new sheriff was in town. Those moves were statements by Young that things had to change.
He said as much in his impressive media appearances on Tuesday.
While these have been the visible changes at the club in a brutal week, there will be many, many more.
The club has empowered former NRL coach Daniel Anderson to rebuild the roster and club legend Ben Creagh to run the football department. They face enormous tasks.
Keaon Koloamatangi comes on board as a frontline enforcer next year from the Rabbitohs. That’s a good start.
But the forwards aren’t their biggest problem. They desperately need Reed to work out as a long-term halfback. Very few teams ever do well in the NRL without a top No.7.
Kyle Flanagan’s failings were exposed by one brutal stat shown by Fox League: after seven rounds, the Dragons’ starting forwards had collectively made more metres than any other NRL pack with 3880, ahead of the Warriors (3715) and the Rabbitohs (3488).
Yet the Dragons have scored only 14 points a game, which is the lowest in the league by a long way. Second worse is the Bulldogs with 20.
The Dragons’ attack is atrocious and gains made by the forwards were squandered time and again.
Anderson’s recruitment job is made harder by the fact Young is an interim coach. How does he convince players to join the club when they don’t know who the head coach will be in 2027?
Surely the board has to give Young a good crack. How long is that? Eight weeks? More?
By then it will be late June or July. Players available for 2027 were able to be signed way back in November 2025. And the Perth Bears are in the hunt now, too.
Who’s left to get? Some ageing players looking for a last contract? They’ve been down that road and it hasn’t worked out.
Next time, it has to. The club has made the finals once in the last decade. And that’s shameful.
Neil Breen is the national sports editor and a Walkley Award-winning journalist.Connect via X.
