Kevin Walters makes call on stripping Adam Reynolds of Brisbane Broncos captaincy
Walters confirmed Reynolds will remain Brisbane captain for as long as he is at the club.
Kevin Walters has insisted that Adam Reynolds will remain the Brisbane captain for the rest of his career amid growing calls to promote Pat Carrigan to captain in 2025. The Broncos made the NRL grand final last year and entered 2024 as one of the premiership favourites.
The Broncos have lost seven of their last eight games and with the side seemingly lacking direction on the park in recent weeks outspoken former Broncos hard man Gordon Tallis has led calls for a change of leadership at the club. “I think the team is lacking leadership. I watch them closely… on Saturday somebody needed to stand up and put a stake in the ground,” Tallis said on Fox Sports' NRL 360.
“(Reynolds) didn’t do it, and in the grand final, he didn’t get them home either. If he’s the captain and he’s not doing it, there might be a chance to put Pat Carrigan there.
“It’s about putting your ego in your pocket because Allan Langer left to go to England and they put me as captain. When he came back, Alf was the captain again but he said ‘No you’re our leader’. In that game on the weekend, under the pump, if I’m playing with Allan Langer, he gets out from dummy half, he does three or four tackles in a row, he looks at us and challenges us. There’s none of that happening at the moment. So maybe there should be a change with (the person) who gets the C next to their name.”
But Walters assured both the 34-year-old Reynolds and the media that his position as skipper was not in question. "I mentioned to him through the week that when (CEO) Dave Donaghy and I went down to sign him in Sydney that he was our captain. As long as he is still playing, he will be our captain," Walters said.
"(The criticism) was a tough thing for him to read but he is a tough fella and he has been around the game long enough to understand how important his captaincy is to our club. When he is playing well and gets his own game moving well he has a huge influence over our team. We saw that against Newcastle (in the 30-14 win in round 20) and we will see that again tomorrow against the Titans."
Adam Reynolds says Broncos have done a lot of soul-searching
Reynolds told Triple M, that Brisbane had an honesty session on Monday on the back of a horror run of results. "We had a soul-searching meeting and got a lot out of it. The response is what we're looking for now," he said.
"We've trained extremely well and had the honest conversations behind closed doors." And Walters is confident that a statement performance is on the cards this weekend.
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"We have spoken about some good honesty this week in our team meetings and our team review," he said. "The players are taking ownership of what happened last week and are making sure it doesn't happen again this week.
"We've got everything to play for. We had everything to play for last week. We've had a good preparation and there is energy amongst the group."
