According to The Sydney Morning Herald, Wests Tigers are furthering their dilemma by preparing to fire chairman Lee Hagipantelis after he rejected a request to resign from the club’s primary shareholder just days after being reappointed.
According to the SMH, Tigers insiders have also explored the possibility of adding former NSW premier and former Tigers chairman Barry O’Farrell and former Australian Olympic Committee president John Coates to the board.
In the meantime, the embattled club is the subject of an external governance and cultural review that’s put both Hagipantelis and chief executive Justin Pascoe under greater scrutiny following the Tigers’ 12th season in succession without involvement in the NRL finals.
The Tigers have had seven permanent NRL head coaches in the 12 seasons that have passed since the joint-venture club last played finals football in 2011, with Tim Sheens, Mick Potter, Jason Taylor, Ivan Cleary, Michael Maguire and Benji Marshall spending time in the job.
Sheens was sacked as head coach following the 2012 season, but he returned to the club as director of football performance in July 2021.
He was then key to the axing of Maguire almost 12 months later, before the Tigers revealed a succession plan involving Sheens and club legend Benji Marshall.
It was announced that Sheens would be head coach in 2023 and 2024, and Marshall would replace the veteran mentor in 2025.
But that plan took a twist when it was revealed in August that Sheens was ending his tenure and Marshall would take up the job early.
The Tigers received back-to-back wooden spoons this year after managing to win just four games.
