The former New Zealand, Wellington, Hurricanes, Sale & Gloucester fly-half who has coached at Racing 92, Munster and Pau talks about his life in the game
Losing two of my brothers when I was just eight and 10 years old had a huge impact on my life. One was killed when he was knocked off his bike and the other died in front of me from a heart condition that no-one knew about. To stand out in a family of boys just five years apart was difficult anyway but when they passed away, there was this pressure that you put on yourself to perform because you wanted to try and make up for your parents’ loss and make them happy.
For me and most boys in New Zealand at that time, it was all about rugby and I was given all the support I needed to make the most of my ability, and I was picked for the Wellington U21s whilst I was still at school, which was very unusual, by Andy Leslie, captain of the ’76 All Blacks team that went to South Africa. My first memories of rugby were getting up early to watch that tour. I had my first senior game for Wellington before I’d played a game for my club, Petone. Steve Pokere, the former All Black centre, was a Mormon so he didn’t play on Sundays because of his religious beliefs and, as most of the games in the Top 6 competition were played on a Sunday, I got an opportunity. We regularly got smashed by 40-odd points. But I got to play alongside greats like John Gallagher and John Schuster, which was a hell of an honour.
Having toured Australia with New Zealand U21s, I was picked on the bench for the 1990 Bledisloe Cup series, aged just 18, and was also in the squad for the tour to France later that year. Mentally I wasn’t ready. Grant Fox got a hamstring niggle before the first game, against a Provence/Cote D’Azur Invitation XV in Toulon, and I came in and had a shocker. Everything happened extremely quickly and that was the start of the downfall for me with New Zealand rugby and the challenges I had to front up to with myself later in life.
I got picked again in ’91 for the tour to Argentina and played okay but wasn’t picked for the World Cup squad. I then had to wait until 1994 for my fourth cap and my first and only start, against France, in Christchurch. We got beaten up all over the park and lost 22-8. It was Jonah Lomu’s debut but, whereas he went on to become the game’s biggest superstar, I never wore the black jersey again.
When rugby went professional I got a contract with the NZRFU to play for the Hurricanes. But, in truth, I’d had enough of New Zealand by then. Outwardly I was this arrogant fly-half who has no issues but inside I was a mess. Like everyone back then, I placed so much emphasis on the importance of the All Blacks jersey, and to be perceived as a failure was something I couldn’t handle. So I packed my bags and left for the UK. I was the first player to break his contract with the NZRU and, after the threat of legal action against me, I had to pay all the money back.
I really enjoyed my time in Manchester with Sale. We had a great backline and I had fun playing alongside people like Chris Yates, Jos Baxendell and Tom Beim. John Mitchell had just arrived as a player-coach and that first year at Sale was brilliant. We finished in the top four and made the 1997 Pilkington Cup final. Conditions were terrible, and the game was too. I think Joel Stransky kicked three out of seven for Leicester and I kicked something like one out of five.
I must admit it took a bit of time to settle in down at Gloucester. I had recently separated with my wife and was going through a divorce at 27/28. Looking back now, I reckon I was a coaches’ nightmare because I had an answer for everything and didn’t work hard enough. It took me years and years to learn from those mistakes.
As time went on, there was definitely a change in me as a person and also as student of the game at Gloucester. Philippe Saint-Andre was great value. I played with him the first year and he trained less than anyone; he was one of the worst trainers in the world. But he was one of the very few wingers I played with who understood the game very well. He had a different outlook on things and culturally I became much more aware of what other nationalities thought about the game. I stopped being so pig-headed and came to realise that the New Zealand way wasn’t the only way.
By this stage, I was 28/29, scoring lots of points (540 in 53 games) and playing some good rugby, and had started to feel more comfortable in myself. Playing alongside Jason Little, post-RWC 1999, was a really cool experience for me, and I got to play with Ian Jones again, he was great.
When Gloucester signed Henry Paul for big money, with the help of the Union, I was quietly ushered out of the door because they wanted him to play 10. Adrian Hadley, a team-mate of mine at Sale, was coaching at Bridgend and he took me down there but my knee wasn’t right and I hardly covered myself in glory. Although we did win the last league title before regional rugby came in, that was a shambolic time for Welsh rugby. Nothing much has changed!
To go into coaching was such a natural step for me because I was that guy on the field who was always talking and organising. I ended up coaching a team called Romanaise to promotion, to the French 3rd Division, while also acting as a translator for the coaches at Racing Metro (now 92). When Jacky Lorenzetti invested his money, I was promoted to the backs coach role and having lost in the ProD2 final the previous year, we won promotion to the Top 14.
After five-and-a-half years there, I was sacked but I continued my coaching education, taking valuable lessons from working with the All Blacks, the Hurricanes and the Crusaders in New Zealand before an opportunity to work under Rob Penney came up at Munster. Munster was an absolute eye-opener for me. I’ve never come across an atmosphere like Thomond Park and rugby-wise, they took it to another level in terms of game structures, analysis, the maximisation of talent and things like that. In some ways though, it was way over the top. The squad was mostly made up of smart, well-educated people but they’d want everything detailed up to six or seven phases rather than just play what was in front of them. I was really looking forward to going to Munster but culturally it was a difficult fit. I learnt so much there, both positive and negative.
The day after we thrashed Toulouse in the Heineken Cup, I flew to France to meet with the Pau president and I signed on the spot because the challenge of getting the club back to the Top 14 after nine years out was one that really appealed to me as well as the chance to implement my own coaching ideas. We created a hell of a rugby team down there and won the ProD2 title at a canter. Colin Slade and Conrad Smith were so influential on the young group of local players we had there and we’re seeing that now with how well Antoine Hastoy is playing. After four years of success a change in the JIFF regulations caused us some issues in terms of recruitment and things didn’t go quite as well after that and I was fired with two to three games of the season to go, even though we were safe.
It was tough to go through that given I had invested so much into Pau and the old fear of failure from my playing days returned to some extent. So I upped sticks and went to Singapore to start a new adventure there but Covid meant it was a bit of a non-starter. I never actually conducted a 15-a-side training session whilst I was there and hence remained one of the only unbeaten international coaches for two years!
When an opportunity to come back to France arose, as coach of the Bay of Biscay team Arcachon, I couldn’t say yes quickly enough. We won promotion to the 4th Division last year and there are plans to go semi-pro.
Whilst I am enjoying it, I think there is still an awful lot I can do in the game at the top level. All these experiences from the great game of rugby, whilst challenging both physically and mentally, I wouldn’t change for the world, because the lessons learned, when I finally sit down to take stock of them, have just been incredible in the first 51 years of my life.
