‘I don’t want to hide’: Flanagan explains surprise sideline move with powerful message to Dragons fans

Confident that he will remain on as head coach of the St George Illawarra Dragons, a defiant Shane Flanagan has declared that he’s “got a job to do” as pressure intensifies over his future.

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Flanagan’s future remains clouded after the Dragons fell to their sixth consecutive loss to begin the 2026 season, and a decision by the club’s powerbrokers could potentially be made as early as next week.

Despite eventually walking away with the loss against the Manly Sea Eagles, Flanagan was impressed with parts of the club’s performance and they even managed to take the lead within the opening minutes of the second half.

“It was definitely an improvement. I thought we competed really hard. (If) a few things would have gone our way, we (would’ve) scraped home for a win,” Flanagan said post-match.

“There was an opportunity for us to score a try just before half-time, we fumbled it…we had our opportunities.

“I think because of the confidence is probably low, those types of things sometimes don’t go our way but I thought they competed really hard.

“I think they fought at different stages throughout the whole year. I thought tonight they fought hard. If they just nailed two of those things, it’s a different story.”

Flanagan made the surprise decision to watch Friday’s game from the sidelines, delcaring: “I don’t want to hide in the coach’s box”.

“I’m here to fight. I’m here to win,” he added.

“I’m on the sideline with the team fighting as hard as I can. I didn’t want to hide in the coach’s box. They have cameras going up there. They can get me as much as they could have got me for 80 minutes if they wanted.”

Questioned about his future, Flanagan provided a one-word response about whether or not he was confident in the people who are set to decide his future.

“Yep,” he added.

Pressed about it, Flanagan added, “All I know is I’ve got a job here to do. It’s not just about winning football games.”

“There’s some other stuff to go with it about educating young players, educating young men (on) how to be NRL players (and) managing a squad.

“We’ve got some new players coming next year but we’ve got to win this year, so that’s part of my job as well.”

Continuing to speak, Flanagan admitted he is in unfamiliar territory, having never experienced anything like this throughout his career as an NRL head coach.

“I’ve never experienced this. Never lost four or five in a row so it is different, especially for the start of the season but all I can ask is the players put in a max effort or real good effort,” a depleted Flanagan said post-match.

“That means they’re playing for me and I thought tonight they did put in a real good effort and they had the class to compete. Tommy [Tom Trbojevic] is probably the difference in the end.”

Meanwhile, co-captain Damien Cook defended Flanagan despite reports emerging that the club had decided not to negotiate contract extensions with off-contract members of the playing squad.

This saw the club rescind an extension to Cook, who foxsports.com.au understood was set to be all but confirmed to re-sign with the Red V for at least another season until the end of 2027.

“The group that we’ve got here have had a really good attitude after eveythying that’s happened last week and how we came in, I thought we just jumped straight into it,” Cook said.

“Backs against the wall, we’ve done everything we needed to do during the week. When it comes down to it, we’re the ones on the weekend out there playing and we’re just not getting it done at the moment.

“So his [Shane Flanagan] rope should be long because he’s not the issue and we’re not doing it out there and wee need to be better.”

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