GREATER SYDNEY RAMS

by Paul Cook –

The Greater Sydney Rams brings together players from Eastwood, Southern Districts, West Harbour, Parramatta and Penrith under head coach Brian Melrose, who led the Western Sydney Rams to the semi-finals back in the 2007 ARC. They will play their home games at Pirtek Stadium, Parramatta.

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THE SQUAD:

WALLABIES: Ben Alexander, Kurtley Beale, Rob Horne, Tevita Kuridrani, Tatafu Polota-Nau

SUPER RUGBY REPRESENTATIVES: Jed Holloway, Taqele Naiyaravoro, Hugh Roach, Benn Robinson, Ben Volavola (all NSW WARATAHS), Chris Alcock (WESTERN FORCE)

FORWARDS: Jared Barry, Rhys Brodie, Marcus Carbone, Andrew Clyne, Jed Gillespie, Michael Kovacic, Dave Lolohea, Guy Millar, Maile Ngauamo, Sakaria Noa, Hugh Perrett, Peni Ravai, Dylan Sigg, Patrick Sio, Senio Toleafoa

BACKS: Jai Ayoub, Ben Batger, Dane Chisholm, Auvasa Faleali’I, Lalakai Foketi, Tom Hill, Apolosi Latunipulu, Michael McDougall, Jarome McKenzie, Henry Seavula, Mark Swanepoel, Henry Taufua

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THE COACH:

Brian ‘Billy’ Melrose makes a welcome return to a head coaching role in Australia after a four year absence. A playing career that took in 240 1st Grade games in Sydney club rugby was a precursor to life in the coaches box, where Brian forged a record of significant improvement and exciting, attacking rugby with West Harbour, Manly and Eastwood in the Shute Shield. He was attack coach of the NSW Waratahs when they reached their maiden Super Rugby final in 2005 and led an unfancied Western Sydney Rams side to the Minor Premiership and a semi-final in the 2007 ARC. Coaching stints in Ireland and the UK with Connacht and London Irish followed before Melrose returned Down Under in 2013 where he has been assisting NRL side St George & Illawarra Dragons as a skills coach.

Rugby News: You are the only NRC coach to have been involved in a head coaching role in the ARC back in 2007, does that give you some advantage in terms of what this competition involves?

“I don’t know if it gives you an advantage but it gives you an awareness of what’s involved, particularly around the travel aspects etc. It’s a really exciting competition, one that gives a great opportunity to players and coaches and I found the level of footy last time was really good and one of the more enjoyable competitions I’ve been involved in.”

You’ve been around the traps a bit since then, coaching in Ireland and the UK, do you return as a better coach now?

“You’re always learning things, I might have been coaching for upwards of a decade now but you always feel like you’re still quite young and there always seems to be something around the corner that you haven’t run in to. But I suppose over the years, you’ve probably seen most things but you’ve never seen it all. I had some great experiences in Europe and yeah, it does help.”

Why does Australian rugby need the NRC?

“The NRC gives the best players in Australia a definitive chance to play against each other so that the public and the selectors can define their form lines. At the moment, it’s very hard for a club player to compete against a Super Rugby player so therefore, there’s no accountability re: selection. This competition gives accountability for players to prove that they’re the best players if they’re contracted or alternatively, to project themselves against that Super Rugby player and potentially win his spot.”

It’s also as important in terms of grooming and growing potential coaches as it is players isn’t it?

“I think it’s the same thing. It’s an opportunity where coaches can potentially show their abilities in a really good environment. It’s not necessarily totally professional but it’s as professional as you can get outside Super Rugby, therefore you get to coach the best level of players and against the best other coaches and again it’s about accountability, who is and who isn’t able to make an impression. With so few opportunities in Australia, it’s a very, very difficult pathway.”

Rams Coaching Team: Head coach Brian Melrose (centre)
with assistants John Manenti (L) & Stu Woodhouse (R)

You are noted as a coach that encourages attractive footy anyway but do you feel the pressure to entertain in this competition?

“I’ve never thought any differently about it. I don’t feel pressure to entertain but I like my teams to play attractively and I like them to play attractively because I think it attracts the players and the offshoot is that crowds tend to enjoy it. As long as we play an attractive game and we compete hard I’m happy.”

You are re-establishing a coaching team with assistant John Manenti. Since you last worked together at the Rams and Eastwood, he’s gone on to be a successful head coach in his own right, has that affected the dynamic between the two of you?

“John was my assistant at the Rams in 2007, he was my assistant with the Australian U20’s and we worked together at Eastwood. When I moved overseas I recommended that John take over at Eastwood and he’s done fantastically well. I like to think that you want the best people around you, I’m not a great advocate of putting people alongside you that don’t threaten you and I think at times that can happen. John and I get along well and sure, he has aspirations as a coach but I don’t fear that, I just think it’s a great thing for the Rams and John is the best assistant I could have, no question.”

There’s been a lot of conjecture on social media regarding the make-up of this Rams squad and the perceived imbalance of represented clubs. In the interests of clarity, can you explain the selection policy?

“I think it’s easy to explain. There’s 33 spots open and to me, the selection of a team is quite simple. I don’t mean simple as in it’s easy to do, I mean the players pick themselves. Eastwood have been at or near to winning the comp since I coached them myself and John Manenti has taken them to four Minor Premierships and two Grand Finals so, if you’re looking for players that not only show ability but a consistency over time as opposed to just current form, the Eastwood boys have done well and the Souths boys have done well.

“If you look at the Southern Districts team, four of them went to NSW Country and those players would have been picked for the Rams so, Souths have five in the squad, would have had nine and their Sevens players are not available to be picked so they may have had 11. Mick Snowden and John Grant from Eastwood went to NSW Country, Michael Alaalatoa from West Harbour went to Country so the selection of the team is a little more complex than it seems on paper.

The One That Got Away: Sitiveni (Steve) Mafi returns to Australian rugby after a hugely successful stint with Leicester Tigers in the English Premiership

“The Country team contains seven players that could have been picked in the Rams and they needed to be replaced and the best performing teams are Eastwood and Southern Districts and it turned out that they did really well and made the Grand Final. There’s some really good performing players from the other teams and we picked some of them and some of them are unlucky to just be shadow players but I think my responsibility as a coach is to pick the player that deserves to be in the team, irrespective of where he comes from.”

The Rams (and other sides) were originally marketed as having a player base drawn from a select band of teams but we now see other players from outside that pool in this squad. Was that always a possibility?

“In the original Western Rams, there were six or seven players that came from outside the region and Kurtley Beale was one of those players and he did wonderfully well. If we look at the other teams, not all the players come from that area and our area is the same. What we’ve got is representative football that wants to represent, yes, the region but also wants to represent the best players available. The competition is about opportunity and some of the players who have come in have done so for various reasons based on us losing players to Country. Spots became available and we filled them with people who desperately wanted that opportunity and my best example would be the Western Sydney Wanderers soccer team. A wonderfully successful team but Shinji Ono didn’t come from Western Sydney and I didn’t see too many people complaining about that.”

What’s the key ingredient to getting a buy-in from supporters for the Rams? Style, success, interaction with your (potential) fan base?

“It’s a combination of all things but clearly, being successful helps. The Waratahs at the start of the season, had lesser crowds but they were playing the same style then as they were in the finals. It was their success that drew people in. Simplistically, of course you want to engage with your community and you want to play an attractive style but it’s contingent upon giving fans some success. I don’t think you can ever guarantee success but you can guarantee that you can compete and that’s my basic mantra. We want a team that really competes and plays hard for their spectators and we’ll play as attractively as we can.”

How hard has it been to bring this project together from scratch?

“Bringing this franchise together would be one of the most challenging tasks I’ve had in football but it’s like anything, the greater the challenge, the greater the opportunity. That challenge hasn’t been made any easier by the fact that Eastwood and Souths contested the Grand Final but the upside of that is that you have players whose belief in themselves is growing and we need that belief to grow because when we play some of the, you might say, Super Rugby aligned franchises with their full quota of professional players, it’s going to be a tremendous challenge.”

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THE CAPTAIN:

Incredibly, Jed Holloway is still only 21-years-old but seems to have packed an awful lot into his burgeoning rugby career already. Rookie of the Year in the 2012 Shute Shield, he played his first Grand Final that year too with his beloved Southern Districts. His form put him on the radar of every Super Rugby franchise in Australia but it was his home state, the Waratahs, that gave him his shot at the big time and last season he featured four times under new coach Michael Cheika and played his part in helping to foster a culture and identity which has seen them go on to lift their maiden Super Rugby title in 2014. Unfortunately for the young loose forward, he suffered a shoulder injury towards the end of the club season which put him out of contention for this year’s golden run but his rehabilitation with Souths has been impressive. Named captain, he led his side to another Shute Shield Grand Final and finished 3rd in the Ken Catchpole Medal listings for the best player in Sydney club rugby. His star is well and truly on the rise.

How exciting is it to be a part of a new competition and a founder member and captain of a new team?

“The competition is a huge opportunity for guys like myself who are on the fringes of Super Rugby and guys who haven’t played Super Rugby yet. It’s a good chance for us to really show our talents and show what we can do at a higher level. For me, being captain of a team that is just starting off is a huge honour because we’ve got guys like Hugh Perrett and Benn Robinson – who’s one of the most capped Waratahs of all time – on board, so to be leading a team with him in it is quite an honour for me and I’m humbled by the fact that Billy (Brian Melrose) chose me.”

What does the NRC offer Jed Holloway?

“I see this is an opportunity to really show what I can do and really prove myself at that higher level. It’s a chance to show how I can be a leader for the team and hopefully, I can flourish and really take that into next season.”

Captain Jed Holloway is fresh off leading Southern Districts to a Shute Shield Grand Final

You’re only 21-years-old but now a captain of your club side and captain of a representative side in a national competition. Do you enjoy being a leader and how do you find leading guys who are older than you and have been around a while longer?

“I’m not going to be a leader who tells guys what to do. I’m not going to go around telling Benny or Hughie how they should play or what we want to do, I’m one to take in advice and I’ll probably learn a lot more off them than they’re going to get off me. I just try to lead by example on the field and try to lead by my actions and make the right decisions for the team, give my team mates the respect they deserve and hopefully, get it back.”

Thursday night matches, Sunday afternoon matches, state/interstate derbies every week, a whole host of new venues and some different laws to play under. It’s going to be a bit out of the box isn’t it?

“Definitely. It’s going to really show guys how professional rugby players live, how you’ve got to switch on and off mentally. It’s not the dream job that everyone thinks of. I love it, I love doing every day of it but it’s very much a mental ride as well as physical and it’s going to give a lot of blokes a chance to experience that and hopefully enjoy it.”

Which of the law tweaks were you happiest to see adopted?

“I’m really happy to see that they’ve upped the amount of points for a try. I think that’s going to be very exciting for people watching and give a bit more reason to put it to the sideline and for the coach to get off your back a bit when you don’t take the points and go for a try! It’s good for Australian rugby and I think teams will thrive off it and it will be a very attacking based competition. It will be good to watch.”

How hard has it been to try and keep an eye on the Rams and what was about to happen when Souths and Eastwood went so deep into the club rugby season?

“Billy was very good in the way he worked in that he expressed his frustration about having two feeder teams in the Grand Final but he left us alone and didn’t fill us with any knowledge about the Rams the week before the GF. Once that was all over and done with, he brought us together as a team and we’ve been loading up on stuff ever since. We’ll be a little bit under-prepared for round one but we have a lot of players who know how to play the game so we’re going to go out there and do what we do best.”

Last Saturday, the majority of this side was facing each other for a Premiership, now you’ve come together to join forces under the one banner. How has that been?

“I’ve got no bad words to say about the Eastwood blokes, they’re a quality bunch of blokes and just spending a couple of days with them I just see how familiar they are with my team mates from Southern Districts so we’ve all bought into the one cause. They were the better team on the day last Saturday, hopefully now we can come together as a squad as soon as possible along with the boys from the other teams and help drive the Rams to an NRC grand final together.”

What about player management. It’s great that we have this third tier and as a fan, more rugby to watch but are there concerns about player burn-out?

“I’d much rather play 10 more games than do another Waratahs pre-season – you know how ‘Cheik’ loves to run up hills! I think all the coaches in the NRC are smart and they understand that guys have had a long season and there’s been no bye weekends in the Shute Shield so they might need to manage a few blokes. We’ve got great staff at the Rams in terms of physios and doctors and coaches who know what’s going on and will be talking to the boys and asking them how they’re feeling, so I don’t think we’ll see too much in terms of burn-out. But it’s the back end of the season so there’s always that higher risk of injury because your body has gone through such a high load all year without a rest. That’s an unknown that’s always there.”

How competitive do you think the Rams can be?

“We’ve set our targets pretty high this year. With the Rams being quite successful the last time we had a national competition like this and the fact that we’ve got the same coaching set-up we’ve set ourselves a focus, not too much on the end goal, but more on coming together as a team because we feel that’s more important. If you don’t want to play for one another then you don’t really want to play footy but if you really want to play for the guy next to you then you’re going to put everything you’ve got into it and if you’ve got 15 blokes putting their heart and soul into a game of footy, you’ll be a hard team to beat whether you’re the best structured side or not.”

If you don’t win the comp, what do you want to be able to look back and say in 10 weeks time?

“I want to see plenty of enjoyment and to look back and say ‘Gee, that was a really good experience’ and one that I couldn’t have achieved with a better bunch of blokes. I’m not too worried about the individual, I’m quite a team man and obviously, I want my team to be successful because I hate losing but I just love playing footy so hopefully I enjoy it. I’m excited because I haven’t experienced anything like this before so I’m just going to take it as it comes and see where it takes us.”

Check out ramsrugby.com.au/ for more info…