HK: You've paid your dues as a coach; from club rugby in Cape Town, to coaching in the English Premiership, before coming back to Western Province and, of course, now being with the Boks. Where did you learn the most and what was it?

GG: "It would be naive of me to say you can never stop learning, Howie, quite honestly no coach can ever say he can stop learning! You can never stop learning and if you think you've got rugby all sussed out, you're in trouble; whether it's a Test match, a game in Potch or even 'just' a club game in Cape Town - you will learn something.

"But I understand what you're asking and I'd say my steepest learning curve came during my time in England. It's a tough cauldron, you're not in your home town and the local press are always on your back as you're a foreigner on 'their' turf. The nature of the Premiership makes it a very tough competition, even if the level of the rugby is not necessarily that comparable to back here - it's a 30-odd week season and you're playing some pretty damn tough teams. Also, there's a pretty tough hiring and firing mentality there and we saw that with my good friend Alan Solomons - an outstanding coach with a fine pedigree who didn't quite get things going his way and Northampton simply got rid of him. For me, as an unknown brand coaching in the Premiership, it was something that was on my mind as they wouldn't have batted an eye-lid to get rid of me. What that taught me was to remain humble and keep your feet on the ground and that every day is a brand new challenge.

"People often ask me what it's like when you read something about yourself in the papers or on the Internet and while it's never nice being attacked in the press, the funny thing is you haven't coached any less or any more when you win or lose a game. Often, that is all you want to explain to people when your coaching credentials are being questioned... It's not an easy job, believe me, but the positives far outweigh the negatives and consider myself very lucky to be involved with the Springbok team - which is full of very, very talented players - and it's certainly something that I don't take for granted. As long as you remember how lucky and privileged you are, you'll be fine, although, funnily enough, I find you learn more about yourself and your coaching skills during adversity!"

HK: Given your coaching experiences abroad, you must know better than most that rugby is fast becoming even more of a global game than it already is. You recently travelled to Argentina for a series of rugby chats. How was it?

GG: "I consider myself very fortunate to be able to travel to countries and to talk to people about this great game of ours. There isn't just one way or a correct way of doing things - you can get results by doing things your own way and still get the results; that is the nature of sport. Rugby, however, is a truly unique game and I don't think there is another sport that allows tall, thin and fast guys to play with and against short and fat guys, with each contributing in their own way - no other sport on the planet allows that and dare I say it, no other sport produces the type of characters that rugby does.

"You can go to Japan, Argentina, Spain, Italy, New Zealand, South Africa - to name just a few - and even though everyone speaks a different language, the one thing you have in common is rugby and suddenly the language barrier doesn't make a difference anymore. I'm very lucky to be involved with a rugby coaching website called RugbyIQ.com and it helps me give back something to the game - my trip to Argentina, for instance, came about because of RugbyIQ's involvement with coaching in that great rugby country. I gave some talks to 500 rugby coaches in Argentina also got to meet with the Argentinean coaches and we swapped some ideas; you know, they're pretty excited about possibly joining the Tri-Nations in a few years' time. They're very keen and enthusiastic, but the game is not professional at all over there and they're very realistic how and where they need to improve things in their own country. It's incredible, however, that they ended third in the 2007 World Cup, given the state of their local game - imagine how good they could be if they were to get their act together?"

  • This article continues on page three...

  • Take a look at Part One of the interview...

  • Former rugby365 editor Howard Kahn is the MD of Sports Network. Email howard@sportsnetwork.co.za for all your media management and sports marketing needs.


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