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Smith's services secure

Newcastle fans can sleep a bit easier after re-securing the services of the greatest coach never to win an NRL premiership, Brian Smith.

Smith will remain as head coach of the Knights until the end of 2010 after receiving a one-year extension on top of his current contract.

"The club is very happy with the progress to date under Brian's tenure," Knights Chief executive Steve Burraston said.

But since arriving at the club two-years ago the one-time Dally M Coach of the Year has unsuccessfully tried to propel his team into the top eight and some fans are said to have been left quite disturbed by the new deal.

"One year is an absolute joke," complained long-time Newcastle loyalist Craven Moorehead.

"The man should've been offered at the very least a ten-year deal.

"That way we would definately have made the top eight and some of the critics of Smithy would end up with poached egg on their face.

"This guy took the Eels to 1 Grand Final and several preliminary final showdowns in the ten years he was there. So I'd like to know why we couldn't offer him a similiar deal?

"We should be looking after our coaches a lot more during the global financial crisis and ten-year contracts offer the sort of job security that I think will bring the best out of the sharpest minds we've got in our game."
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