North Harbour have retained Liam Barry as coach even though they finished a distant last in the second-tier Championship division of this year's ITM Cup.
Barry, who took over the union in 2011, will be joined by Alex Dowd, who has been head coach of the North Harbour development side since 2009 and successfully coached Takapuna to the club premiership titles in 2007 and 2008.
Jeff Wilson, whose contract as assistant coach expired at the end of the 2012 season, had previously advised he would not reapply for the role.
"While 2012 has been a frustrating year for North Harbour, the board is confident that the combination of two very capable coaches with a strong North Harbour pedigree is the right choice to leverage the rugby talent in the North Harbour region," North Harbour chairman John Morgan said.
"The North Harbour Rugby Union has made significant progress in recent years in many aspects of its activities from the growth in player numbers to almost 10,000, the strength of its community rugby programme, to its success in many age-group representative competitions. The board, like many of our fans, stakeholders and supporters want that progress extended to include success on the field for our ITM Cup team."
