Spotlight goes on the coaches
New Zealand Super Rugby coaches don’t get bladed mid-season.
Whether Stephen Kearney deserved to get dumped by the Warriors after South Sydney mowed his team down last Friday night is a conversation to be held elsewhere. It happened. It proves how ruthless NRL clubs can be.
New Zealand’s five Super Rugby clubs have had their dramas over the years, let’s not pretend otherwise. It’s just they do a decent job of keeping them inhouse.
Only occasionally do juicy titbits spill into the public domain; when Jed Rowlands was quickly shifted on after succeeding Sir Graham Henry at the Blues in
1999, the spotlight burned bright on the issue of why he was appointed in the first instance.
Then there was the blow-up at the Highlanders in
2003; a group of unhappy senior players rebelled against Laurie Mains, leading to him departing at the end of the season.
Will such tasty morsels be dropped into the Super Rugby Aotearoa soup in coming weeks? Probably not.
But then again, we may not see it coming. These missiles can come from nowhere. Just ask Kearney.
1. What next for Mark Hammett?
Highlanders assistant coach Hammett has revealed he’s leaving after four years at the club, but not his future plans. The former All Blacks hooker, 47, is familiar with the peripatetic nature of rugby coaching. Controversy, too.
He started as an assistant at the Crusaders, but made his name as a hard-nosed boss when appointed boss of the Hurricanes in 2011; Hammett charged into his work by demanding a change in attitudes from senior players.
When he told All Blacks Andrew Hore and Ma’a Nonu, who resisted the new coach’s charms and probably not in diplomatic terms, he wanted them off his books, the situation went TNT.
The spectacular bust-up led to Hore and Nonu joining the Highlanders and Blues respectively. After the 2014 season Hammett moved to the Cardiff Blues in Wales, then joined the Sunwolves in 2015.
He was also a caretaker coach for the Japanese national team before being added to the Highlanders staff.
2. The Highlanders’ Aaron Mauger is the only head coach in New Zealand whose contract expires at the end of the season.
Initially the Highlanders hierarchy wanted to make a decision on his future this month, before Covid-19 arrived. The deadline shifted.
The Highlanders’ record in Super Rugby before the pandemic struck was, to be polite, modest: One win, four losses and a draw. The last-gasp victory over the Chiefs in the first Super Rugby Aotearoa fixture helped stitch the wounds inflicted earlier in the season. It’s a start.
3. What’s worse for a professional athlete than being forced into lockdown?
Getting injured when he rejoins his mates on the grass.
Warnings that players could break down when they returned to contact training didn’t come from prescient fortune tellers. Several coaches warned us, and there’s been carnage among a number of All Blacks.
Crusaders captain Scott Barrett’s foot problem has ruled him out of the new competition without taking part, and the back injury to new All Blacks skipper Sam Cane has, to date, prevented him leading the Chiefs.
Jordie Barrett is yet to get a run for Hurricanes because of a shoulder problem. And ditto for Josh Ioane (groin) at the Highlanders.
4. A paucity of scrums in the first two rounds had Blues scrum coach Ben Afeaki joking his job might be at risk.
He might not need to worry just yet. A howling southerly laced with horizontal rain in Wellington or Christchurch has turned more than a few games into turgid scrum festivals. And given more than a few setpiece coaches’ reason to smile like cracked pumpkins.
5. Cutting up rough at the Orange Roughy?
Yep, the Crusaders v Chiefs will be tearing into it at Orangetheory Stadium on Sunday.
Prop Joe Moody expects ‘‘a bit of niggle’’. Well, well. These two teams rarely disappoint.