George Williams column: Warrington buzz with Burgess deal and Bateman arrival

Sam’s new deal is a big coup for Warrington. He’s been brilliant. The biggest thing with Sam is he’s not long out of it.

He was an elite player and that doesn’t always make you an elite coach, but he is, he understands what the players need at certain times.

Sometimes it’s hard to have a conversation with the coach when we as a group are sore, we don’t need to train today and a lot of coaches don’t get it. With Sam, if the senior group say “we’re flagging a bit after a tough game against Wigan, why don’t we do a recovery session on a Monday?” he listens to the boys.

It might sound like a little thing but you get the group onside and when you go back to training the next day, everyone trains harder than ever. It’s giving us a little bit and we’ll give everything we’ve got back.

Everyone just wants to play for him, he has high standards because he was a great player, knows what works and what doesn’t, we’re all just trying to follow his lead at the moment.

He has the banter, he still has all the chat, he’s into the boys. A lot of lads consider him a friend which is what you want from a coach. Technically he knows what he’s on about but I think a lot of it is man-managing your team which is something he’s brilliant at. Matt Peet has been applauded at Wigan for how he manages his players and I feel like it works, that’s how it works these days.

You have your assistants that are the gurus and the brains, and you have a man-manager in the coach.