RARING TO GO
Winner Rennie ready to repeat success at Warriors
DAVE RENNIE is late. Not in a tardy, unprofessional way. It’s just that his arrival to take up his new post as head coach of Glasgow Warriors was delayed a little. Mainly down to his own success.
‘Ideally, I would have been here three months ago,’ said Rennie as he was finally unveiled at Scotstoun yesterday, having agreed the deal to succeed Gregor Townsend a year before.
The reason the 53-year-old New Zealander has only just arrived is down to his contractual commitments to the Waikato Chiefs — and the fact he kept on winning. Indeed, the Kiwi club’s involvement in this season’s Super Rugby only came to an end a fortnight ago, with Rennie’s side exiting at the semi-final stage.
Now, with only two weeks to go before the new Guinness Pro14 season kicks off, he doesn’t have much time to acclimatise. However, Rennie insists that no matter how his new charges begin the campaign, it will be how they finish it that really counts.
‘The biggest thing is the lack of time I’ve had to be in front of the boys,’ said Rennie, who admits he is ‘living out of a suitcase’ in a Glasgow hotel, having yet to move into a home of his own with wife Stephanie, while he is still in the process of bringing his two dogs to the country.
‘However, we have some outstanding men in our coaching group and Phil Healey has come over with me (from the Chiefs) as our head trainer. He is a phenomenal man and has been negotiating with the trainers we have here to try to get the boys in the nick we need.
‘Ultimately, you’ve got to be consistent enough to be in the race at the end of it. You don’t need to be the best team in the first three weeks but you need to be hitting form. And when you get to play-offs, you’ve just got to be the best team for 80 minutes, three weeks in a row.’
Rennie has had to rely heavily on his four-strong backroom staff in his absence over the summer to get his players ready.
The build-up goes up a notch at the weekend when he takes charge of Glasgow for the first time in a friendly against Northampton Saints at Stirling.
He will give some of his fringe players a chance at Bridgehaugh, the home ground of Stirling County, as he freely admits he has not seen a lot of them in action.
‘I have watched a lot of Glasgow footage, every game they played last year, but the guys I didn’t see will get their opportunity on Saturday and it will be a pretty young team against Northampton,’ said Rennie, who led the Chiefs to back-to-back Super Rugby titles in 2012 and 2013.
‘Barely any of our Scottish internationals will play and a number of guys we signed won’t play. These men who will have worked hard over the last six weeks have an opportunity to show me what they can do.’
RENNIE has also been hindered a little by his predecessor, with new Scotland head coach Townsend calling an international training camp in St Andrews early next week that will deprive him of many of his players for at least two days.
‘It’s not ideal but it’s not a disaster either,’ said the Warriors head coach. ‘A number of those guys have only just come back in to camp with us.
‘In New Zealand, a lot of guys used to go off to All Blacks camps as well. We just have to make sure we have clarity around what we’re trying to do.’
The former school teacher, who was forced to retire from rugby due to a shoulder injury at the age of 27, accepts that he has a hard act to follow in Townsend.
Four out of the five seasons he was in charge, he took Warriors into the Pro12 play-offs, with the highlight coming in 2015 when they lifted the league title.
The only time Glasgow failed to make the play-offs was last season but Townsend still brought them relative success as his team made the knockout stage of the European Champions Cup for the first time in their history.
Asked if following Townsend was daunting, Rennie said: ‘Yeah, but if I thought it was an issue, I would not have taken the job.
‘I am very excited with the challenge and selection is key. We have some good boys and have some challenges with the way the season is, having to rotate the players who can play only so many games due to Scottish commitments. There will be times when our depth will be tested.
‘I think, though, there are a lot of backs over here who are as good as any we’ve got in New Zealand. The thing is to try to develop the game so that we have more threats on the park.
‘It’s a real disappointment that Stuart Hogg came home early from the Lions and didn’t get to play in the Tests. I’m pretty confident he would have started that first Test. He’s electric.
‘I’ve been really impressed by Finn Russell. He has a good running game and is pretty astute.
‘I’ve also been really impressed with Ryan Wilson. It’s not just the way he plays but the way he leads. Jonny Gray is out injured at the moment but he is an impressive character. A guy who can make 200 and something tackles without missing one is just phenomenal. There are lots of good men at Glasgow.’
UNSURPRISINGLY, given he has only been at Scotstoun for just three days, Rennie had not made up his mind on who will be his captain. Last season, the Warriors appointed Gray and Henry Pyrgos as co-captains.
‘We had dual captains at the Chiefs every year since 2012,’ said Rennie. ‘We used it as a chance to share responsibilities.
‘The challenge here is that we could pick a couple of captains who may be Scottish internationals and lose them for a reasonable chunk of the year. We will work out what works best.’
Rennie also made it clear his only focus was bringing success to Glasgow and that he didn’t see the Warriors as a stepping stone to eventually replacing Steve Hansen as All Blacks coach.
‘I’m not coming here to think I’ll position myself for an All Black role,’ he said. ‘Who knows, Steve Hansen might stay there for another couple of World Cups.
‘I saw this as a great opportunity to grow. I’m going to learn a lot.’