Rugby: Pivac travels tortuous path

Wayne Pivac's playing career was ended by a knee injury suffered in a touch football match 10 years ago. He was tripped from behind, crashed to the deck, and wrecked a knee ligament.

He was only 27, but figured he was about to be dropped from the North Harbour side, and decided on lengthy rehabilitation rather than going through surgery and attempting a comeback.

He still wanted to stay closely involved in the game so took up coaching. Until last year, there was one success after another. He guided Takapuna to three consecutive North Harbour grand finals, winning the last, and his North Harbour second XV also won their wars.

But North Harbour knocked back Pivac's ambition of coaching the union's top side so he headed to Northland with the aim of winning them first division status. His Northland side managed that in one glorious hit, storming through the second division in 1997.

It was a great provincial debut for Pivac, the descendant of a Croatian family which had immigrated to Kaitaia in the far north, before Pivac's family settled on Auckland's North Shore.

But while Pivac refuses to talk about the backroom dealings up north, there is no doubt that his relationship with the administrators went completely sour last year.

Part of the problem may have stemmed from former Auckland Blues and NPC coach Graham Henry's desire to bring Pivac on board as his assistant, with the intention of grooming him for the top job.

Henry did extensive scouting work to find an assistant, which led to Auckland officials approaching Pivac last year. Pivac said he immediately informed the Northland board, who wanted him to stay on.

Pivac had also made it clear he was embarking on a coaching "career path" and did not regard the Northland coaching arrangement, where he was required to have a day job managing an electrical company, as the ideal way of preparing an NPC side.

In his first year coaching Northland, Pivac - a policeman for 14 years before leaving under the Police Employment Rehabilitation Fund scheme - had commuted from Auckland where he worked as a mediation officer for resource consent applications.

Last year, he and his family moved north. Ironically, Pivac reckoned he ended up with less time to devote to coaching because he was heavily involved with restructuring at the electrical firm.

It is difficult to judge what effect the behind-the-scenes problems had on the Northland side, but they crashed to defeat in every NPC game, including a 10-84 hiding at the hands of Otago. Pivac's coaching reputation had slumped.

"I don't believe the Northland team were aware of any problems," said Pivac, who believes injuries to key players also cost the newly-promoted side dearly.

"It would be fair enough for people to question why Auckland have appointed me ... Northland didn't win a game last year.

"But I think if people with a knowledge of the game looked at the facts and appreciated some of the problems, they would look at it differently."