Paul Darbyshire signed as a player in 1987 and has been with the Wolves ever since with the exception of a year spent in Australia at the end of his playing days.

He returned from down under in 1997 to join the coaching and development team at Wilderspool and now combines work with the academy squad, with his main role as assistant coach to the Wolves first team.

This year sees Steve Anderson take over as technical director at Warrington, following the clubs decision to part with Darryl Van der Velde at the end of last season.

Anderson arrives with impressive skills, having had extensive coaching experience in his native Australia, including a stint as assistant coach with the national team. Who was admitting to a little sadness at Van der Velde departure, Darbyshire is clearly enthusiastic about the direction in which Anderson is taking the club.

He says: "Its like being at a different club. He has a completely different approach from Darryl, under whom I've been working for the last three or four years. Its good for me to get a different perspective and some new ideas and its good for the club. It's a three year plan and its going to very interesting to stay with the squad for the time and see where it takes us."

Paul Marquet of the Wolves

The Wolves have made a patchy start to the season, comfortably beaten at home by a classy St. Helens side in the challenge cup fourth or fifth round ??, then needing a miraculous second half comeback to defeat Halifax Blue Sox in the first round of the super league fixtures.

Most commentators were in agreement that Steve Anderson Half time team talk in the Blue Sox game would have made very interesting listening, though would probably not have been fit for broadcast. Paul Darbyshire smiles at the recollection, but says that all though the players had it made clear to them that they were letting themselves and the club down, important strategic points were made.

Paul Darbyshire said: "Steve reminded them that we'd been trying all week to play a certain way and had discussed that before the game, but once the game kicked off it all seemed to go out the window.
" Maybe there were a few nerves out there with it being the first game of the new season, but it really was poor. Steve just said, 'What have you been doing out there?' and then told them to get back on track and play as they had been doing all week in training."

The Wolves team going from the ridiculous to the sublime is nothing new to seasoned observers and Warrington have often been described as a Jekyll and Hyde side.

Last season they took the scalps of the top five clubs in the super league at their Wilderspool home, yet finished disappointedly outside the play off places. Consistency has been emphasised as the key to success and is the overriding ambition of the coaching staff.

The new regime has seen a changing of the guard at the playing staff level too, with no fewer than sixteen new arrivals in the first team squad for this season.

The departure of big name players from the club in the last twelve months has made a fresh start a necessity. Most notable of the absentees are Tawera Nikau and Allan Langer, who have returned to the southern hemisphere. Both made a huge impression on all those involved with the club and will, as Paul Darbyshire reflects, be sorely missed.

"Tawera was obviously a big influence both on and off the field a real leader in every way. Too be honest he is the kind of character who comes along once a lifetime and he has been a great player to be involved with. He's going to be a big loss."

Although the coaching staff are keen to stress that it has not been a deliberate ploy, it has been noticeable that Steve Anderson's first few selections of the season have seen big men employed all over the field.

From the front row of the pack, out to Dave Kidwell on the wing, Warrington are a very imposing side. It will be interesting to see whether the pitches get firmer and sides start to play more flowing rugby in the season. Steve Anderson is forced to rethink in this particular area.

The Challenge Cup tie against St. Helens highlighted a certain lack of pace and invention in the backs and may prove to be an obstacle to the Wolves progression this season.

An excessive reliance on Lee Briers, the talented full back cum stand-off, for a creative spark, could place too much responsibility on his shoulders, to the detriment of the team.

Briers is the ace in the Warrington pack, the man team-mates look to for inspiration and whom opposition defences fear. Paul Darbyshire has noticed a new maturity in Briers at the beginning of this season and feels it may lead to bigger and better things from their star.

John Clark tackles one of the Saints players

"Lee's a very talented player - an international player of good standing. He's another match winner and you need players like him in your side. Lee appreciates that there are deficiencies in his game, as there are in many players, but he's done this season is to work hard to rectify them."

It's just as well, because Super League needs players such as Briers to forfill their potential, given all the talk regarding the possibility of the union game swallowing up rugby league in the future.

Paul Darbyshire firmly believes this will not happen, suggesting there will always be a place for both codes. As he points out, there are clearly sufficient pools of player talent for both to dip into, whilst the geographical divide remains a strong case against the likelihood of any merger.

He expects there to be plenty more code switching from players, but expresses no worries that all the high profile switches seem to be from league to union.

Those supporters that care only for the 13-man code cannot have been happy to see such luminaries as Jason Robinson, Henry Paul and Iestyn Harris leave the fold, but as Darbyshire points out, they needed fresh challenges and have arguably already been replaced.

Ben Walker (of Leeds Rhinos, Harris' replacement) as a prime example of new blood coming in to pick up where those three left off.

So impressed has Darbyshire been by Leeds, that he cites them as the most likely to wrest the Super League from the clutches of the Bradford Bulls. Meanwhile he and the rest of the Wolves will keep striving to improve to achieve consistency. Out with the old and in with the new.