Melbourne Storm will play their eighth grand final under coach Craig Bellamy when they take on Sydney Roosters on Sunday. Bellamy, who is regarded by many as the best coach in the game, has formed a relationship with former first grade coach Roy Masters.
Masters, who coached Wests and St. George in the 1970's and 80's, is now a senior Fairfax journalist living in Melbourne.
"I'm just a bit of a sounding board for him, once a week I go might down to training or have a cup coffee or a phone call. I wouldn't say that I coach the coach, but you have to ask yourself that question - who coaches the coach?" Masters tells ESPN.
"I can remember as a coach being very lonely. I really want to give my thoughts about something, but the assistant coaches look to you for leadership, you can't go to the board and spill your guts, you can't go to your senior players, because they're the same as the assistant coaches.
"There are some times you really need to bounce ideas off someone, someone who has absolutely nothing to gain from it. Craig trusts me to talk to him, even though I'm a journalist... I genuinely like the bloke and I'm a sounding board."
And what are the key ingredients that make Bellamy so successful? For Masters, it is the honesty with which he communicates and his insatiable work rate.
"Highly professional, he [Bellamy] combines the two greatest qualities of being a coach; No. 1 a great communicator and No. 2 a high work rate with respect to imparting the technical skills," Masters says.
"When I say a great communicator, I'm not saying that he can string a good sentence together or anything like that. One word would appear in every sentence and you know what that word is; but there is absolute intrinsic honesty in his communication."
According to Masters, players will respect their coach more and perform better for him if they know exactly where they stand. Aside from Bellamy's dedication to hard work, it is the ability to be blunt, to not sugarcoat any message and leave no doubt in the minds of the players, which sees the two-time premiership coach gain the best results from his team.
"He has a very, very high work ethic with a great knowledge of technical skills and that intrinsic honesty that all the players respect, there's no bull---- with him," Masters said.
"In my day those two qualities were still the two biggest qualities, but the players, a lot of the things they evolved themselves, you didn't have a lot of time for technical instruction. Tactics then were a little bit more important, too, than they are today; you don't see as many set-pieces today as you did in my day."
Of the seven grand final appearances under Bellamy, the Storm have won four, but have only two premiership titles to show for their efforts. The great salary cap scandal saw them lose two of their trophies and all of their 2010 season competition points. With Bellamy's leadership, the Storm were able to bounce back to defeat the Bulldogs in the 2012 decider.
Sunday will mark their third consecutive appearance on the NRL's biggest day, after losing to the Sharks in 2016, before beating the Cowboys to win the 2017 title.
Bellamy, who started his coaching career as an assistant to Wayne Bennett, has a long way to go to emulate his tutor's seven premiership titles. Victory over the Roosters on the weekend will take his total to three.
With Billy Slater joining Cooper Cronk in hanging up the purple jersey and Cameron Smith not far behind them, the future for the Storm remains unclear. But if any coach can mould the new crop of players into an ongoing premiership threat, it is the hard-working, no-nonsense Bellamy.