Official! Thorn takes over from dumped Stiles

It is an extraordinary rise in coaching status for the former Brisbane Broncos rugby league forward turned World Cup-winning All Black in 2011.

Thorn only retired from top-tier rugby as a player at 40 in 2015 after more than two decades as one of the most respected figures in both codes.

At the time, he admitted that coaching was a great unknown and he had everything to learn.

In just over two years he has convinced the Queensland Rugby Union he is the man to drag them out of their four-season rut.

They are backing the force of his personality and standards, with Tony McGahan as his senior assistant, because by every measure he is still a cub coach.

Thorn’s only head coaching experience has been with this year’s undefeated Queensland Under-20s and the Queensland Country side he has transformed from easybeats into leaders of the National Rugby Championship.

He worked with the Reds players this season as a contact coach, on tackling and in the gym as a much-admired tyrant with high standards.

It is a major leap of faith from the QRU board and the decision was recommended by a rugby committee which included former Wallabies Nathan Sharpe, Mark Connors and Sam Cordingley.

Stiles only returned from a family holiday in the US on Wednesday and the decision was relayed upon his return.

The drums had been beating about his shaky tenure even before he went abroad following a post-season review of the Reds’ poor four-from-15 season.

For weeks, QRU chief executive Richard Barker, who also sat on the rugby committee, could offer no guarantee that Stiles would still be at the helm for 2018.

It was the smoke that turned into Thursday’s fire.

Stiles will be crushed. He played more than 90 matches for the Reds and poured more than a decade into his varied coaching education to win his dream job.

He invested so much into restoring a strong team culture at the Reds and was unafraid of making tough calls like moving on 112-game stalwart Rob Simmons in June so the Reds could keep young gun locks Izack Rodda and Lukhan Tui, who have since played for the Wallabies.

Stiles stirred the Reds into producing their best interstate performance since 2013 against the NSW Waratahs this year when he was behind the masterstroke of wearing maroon jerseys for the one-off occasion.

Unfortunately, that clash was still lost 29-26 at the death, despite a four tries-to-two ledger. When heaped on top of another close-call loss to the champion Crusaders, when the Reds’ poorly managed the final minutes, it eroded Stiles’s position.

Thorn will be the Reds’ third change of direction in coaching since Ewen McKenzie guided the team to the finals for last time in 2013.

Richard Graham (2014-16) was sacked two games into the 2016 season, Stiles and Matt O’Connor completed the treading water year of 2016 as co-coaches and Stiles ran the show this year.

Graham, O’Connor and now Stiles were cut short on their contracts which has heaped financial pain on the QRU.

This is on top of the clumsy contracting of 2015 coaching consultant John Connolly which recently cost the organisation $ 150,000-plus in a court decision.