The Rabbitohs are in discussions with Furner,who was Tim Sheens’ assistant at the Wests Tigers last season,to rejoin the club where he previously held a role as an assistant coach. An announcement could be made as early as Wednesday.
Phil Gould believes points should be shared between teams over a 'no-win situation' from golden point.
The former Raiders coach is yet to put pen to paper with the Rabbitohs,but the club is keen to provide Demetriou with additional resources and experience.
Furner,53,had been in talks about joining Eddie Jones as a defensive coach with Japan’s national rugby team. He received a call from Demetriou on Sunday about returning to Souths to work as a defence coach with the forwards.
Furner left Souths at the end of 2018 to become head coach at Leeds. The Rabbitohs’ then head coach Anthony Seibold departed Redfern for Brisbane just a few months later.
Furner remains close with Jack Wighton – he handed the centre his debut in Canberra – and is friends with several senior Rabbitohs,including Cody Walker and Cam Murray.
Former Raiders coach David Furner will join Jason Demetriou at South Sydney.Getty
This masthead reported last week the club was privately concerned with the level of experience on Demetriou’s coaching staff following the departure of two assistant coaches last year.
As part of an end-of-season review,the Rabbitohs advised Demetriou to hire a senior assistant to replace John Morris and Sam Burgess,but he instead promoted NSW Cup coach Joe O’Callaghan to fill the void.
The Rabbitohs,who persuaded Demetriou to take on Burgess as an assistant last year despite the coach’s misgivings,didn’t want to tell him who he could and couldn’t appoint again and gave their blessing to appoint just O’Callaghan.
Furner was the main recommendation put forward to Demetriou last year,but the coach instead chose to promote from within. After a 1-5 start to the season,and with his job on the line,Demetriou has now made a request to Furner.
Rabbitohs players during their loss to the Sharks.Getty
“I’m close with David and I know he’ll have a good impact on improving our defence,” Demetriou told this masthead on Tuesday morning when asked about Furner’s arrival.
South Sydney chief executive Blake Solly hinted at the changes after the team’s.
“Clearly a 1-5 start to the season is never good enough for our club,” Solly said. “The questions we will be asking is what can we all do to improve and what can we all do to help support the players,Jason and the football staff?”
Morris was previously entrusted with overseeing the team’s defensive set-up,but Demetriou has taken over that department in 2024.
The team’s defence has been terrible so far this year,leaking 196 points at an average of 32.6 per game.
It is the worst defensive record in the competition by a long way. North Queensland have leaked the second most points in the competition with 149 in the same number of games.
The Rabbitohs also have the second worst attacking record in the competition with an average 15.6 points per game,only better than (12 points per game).
Furner’s last head coaching role was at Canberra from 2009-13. He has since held assistant coaching roles at Newcastle,Canterbury,the Cowboys,Tigers and South Sydney.
Demetriou’s job is safe for now with Solly saying the resilience and fight the club hoped to see from the players was evident against the Sharks.
what would be required to get that time and I think the team showed that,” Solly said.
“It was a brave performance in really difficult circumstances.
“Clearly there’s always room for improvement but the character and the performance stacks up with exactly what Nick said we needed to see on Saturday.”
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