New Waratahs assistant coach Simon Cron believes his side’s new recruits will be able to have an impact on the Super Rugby squad in 2018.

After their worst season in several years, Cron and head coach Daryl Gibson announced the signings of Norths pair Will Miller and Nick Palmer, former Easts and Western Force back Alex Newsome, Lalakai Foketi and a host of Australian U20s players including Harry Johnson-Holmes, Lachlan Swinton, Cody Walker and Shambeckler Vui.

“Obviously I’ve had a lot to do with Will Miller and Nick Palmer and I’m excited by the fact that Will has already played Super Rugby and Nick has played over in the Mitre 10 Cup. I think they’ll both add a competitive element to the squad because they are real competitors,” Cron said.

“I think I coached five of those boys in the Australian U20s this year and they’re real up and comers.

“The message to them is that they’ve got to make themselves genuine options at Super Rugby level, which means they need to do everything between now and the start of the year to do that, whether that be get bigger, faster, fitter or smarter and that’s exciting.”

The Waratahs won just four of 15 matches in 2017, but Cron seemed confident about his side’s 2018 chances, after adding Wallabies gun Kurtley Beale and the relatively inexperienced group of recruits to the current squad.

“There is a great player group already at the Waratahs and every winning season comes from a team environment that is filled with good humans who are willing to work hard,” he said.

“I’ve only been here for four weeks, but they are certainly putting the work in at the moment. You can learn a lot from a tough season like 2017 and I think they all have and that is going to make them better athletes and players.”

Cron will speak alongside former Wallabies coach Bob Dwyer, RUPA president Dean Mumm, and Rugby Australia Community & Strategy general manager Andrew Larrett on Tuesday evening at a Rugby Business Network event in Sydney.

The panel will review the 2017 Australian rugby season, take a look ahead at 2018 and discuss all things Australian rugby at an interesting time for the sport in the country.

“I’ve only met Bob a few times, but he seems like a great human being. The key thing is that every person in that room loves rugby, so I don’t think it’s about getting tied down with the negatives. It’s about saying, we all love the game, what do we do to make it better,” Cron said.

“I’ll be able to add from my experiences in club rugby, the limited experiences I’ve had at the Waratahs and from my time with the Australian U20s, so it’ll be an interesting discussion.”

Click here for tickets and more information about Tuesday evening’s Rugby Business Network event.