SEN NRL expert Cameron Smith has teed off at certain members of the Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs playing squad after reports emerged of unrest due to punishments for arriving late.
The Daily Telegraph initially reported that a first-grade player walked out of training after being forced to wrestle 12 players as a result of showing up late.
The player at the centre of this story reportedly requested the week off training due to mental health reasons and will miss the Bulldogs’ final game of the season.
Further reports also suggest the players were frustrated with training sessions that ran from 8am until 5:30pm.
“First and foremost, that’s just unacceptable turning up to work late, that’s your job, if you turn up late there’s consequences,” Smith said on SEN 1170 The Captain’s Run.
“They operate and work in a high-performance environment, there’s standards and expectations around getting your job done properly, part of that is being punctual, you don’t just rock up to work when you want to.
“There should be no confusion around what time your training starts, that’s your own responsibility to understand what time you need to be at training, you’ve got to be ready to go.”
Coming from one of the greatest NRL sides of the modern era, Smith acknowledged the importance of establishing a winning culture at a rebuilding club.
“They haven’t been winning football games for a long time, so they don’t have that winning culture,” Smith added.
“To all the people thinking, ‘Culture, culture it’s this fancy word that keeps being thrown around’, I don’t tend to like using the word culture and it was associated with my old club the Melbourne Storm a lot.
“All culture is, it’s standards and behaviours that you demonstrate every day, it’s standards that you accept, or you don’t accept.
“It’s something that you want to build quite strong and something that everyone believes in and upholds, that’s all culture is.”
The Bulldogs will look to put another disappointing season to bed when they face the Gold Coast Titans on Sunday afternoon.