Super League Final: Salford win would be bigger than Leicester’s Prem title, claims boss Ian Watson
IAN WATSON was favourite to be the first coach to get the boot eight months ago.
His Salford Red Devils were 150-1 to win the title. Only newly-promoted London Broncos had odds higher.
Their hand-to-mouth, not-a-pot-to-pee-in financial position was so precarious, there were some who said they should be dumped into the Championship in any case.
Yet Watson will lead out his troops into the Grand Final at Old Trafford, on the verge of the greatest story the Super League has ever told.
Think Leicester City’s title win with knobs on. This would be more like Lincoln City managing it.
And just for that added touch of romance, the man who has masterminded it all is as Salford as Albert Finney, Tony Wilson or John Cooper Clarke.
The home-town coaching hero doing as much for the town in the rugby league world as LS Lowry did for the art scene.
It has been a remarkable journey for both Watson and Salford. A year ago they finished second from bottom and only sealed survival with a couple of games to go.
Owner Marwan Koukash left, so did a host of players, and local businessman Paul King put his house up to lead a consortium to buy it and keep them in business.
It was the latest fire Watson, born two miles from their old Willows ground, had fought since he was appointed in 2015.
His first year in charge ended with Salford coming back from eight points down with only two minutes left, to beat Hull KR in the “loser goes down” Million Pound Game.
Even this time he has had to contend with knowing he must start next season without 12 of this term’s heroes, after they were cherry-picked by rivals.
Yet that is the way it always has and always will be for Watson — a lifelong Manchester United fan who was an Old Trafford regular in the days of Bryan Robson and Mark Hughes.
Watto, whose entire backroom and medical team numbers only six, just faces it all with a smile and a touch of steel. It has worked well so far.
He insisted: “The Leicester thing was mentioned but this is probably bigger because they had money and we don’t!
“We don’t have the support base but the belief is there among the community and fans as well as team and club.
“We’ve built this team on a work ethic, relying on each other, working for each other. That mirrors the community. Salford’s a grubby town, all ‘roll your sleeves up and get stuck in’.
“Our budget is the lowest, we can’t spend huge money, there is no dispensation for kids coming through the academy because we don’t have one.
“We don’t have a benefactor, we have to be really careful what we spend and we’re miles behind financially — but in spirit and endeavour we’re well up there.”
Salford may have finished 18 points behind Saturday’s favourites St Helens in the regular season but lost by only two when they met at the table-topper’s ground in May.
It was a game which convinced Salford’s stars they could mix it with anyone — and they proved it by humbling Wigan in their own backyard in last week’s qualifier.
Yet while they are a match for anyone on the field, when it comes to cash they still cannot compete. Hence the reason Man of Steel winner Jackson Hastings — off to Wigan next season — is just one of a dozen who must be replaced.
Watson added: “It’s almost like when you play together as schoolkids and eventually the side splits up. We’ve got that because we don’t have big money to keep them all.
“Jackson spoke to me when the Wigan thing came out and was in tears. The fact is he didn’t really want to go because of all we had done for him.
“If I could have told him then he’d play in a Grand Final at the end of the year, I think he’d have said ‘Mate, I ain’t going anywhere’. I think all the boys leaving would have stayed.
“But it’s life. Things like that happen, we have to roll with it and move on.”
There would be no better way for his departing stars to say farewell than to win on Saturday night. It would be the greatest of a host of golden Old Trafford memories for Watson.
He added: “I’d come to all the home games with my dad in the days of Robson, Hughes and the rest. Robbo used to pass me on his old shorts and bits of kit.
“My dad knew him because he would pop into the Blue Bell pub at Monton, where my dad worked for a bit.
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“I used to come to Old Trafford all the time and it’s been a great journey for us to get here, coming from where we were.
“But being here isn’t enough. There will be no messing about, taking pictures or looking at the stadium.
“We are here to do a job and we are here to win.”