KEY POINTS:
It sounds strange coming from national sevens coach Gordon Tietjens, but he is not sure coaches get a fair crack in New Zealand. He also thinks a player like the great Christian Cullen might struggle to be discovered these days.
It sounds odd because it's a bleak statement and Tietjens has an impeccable winning record that is anything but bleak.
But listen to what he has to say about the fate of coaches in the new age of professional, results-or-bust rugby: "Coaches are now judged on their record. Solely on their record. A career in coaching can be all over in less than a year now if results are bad, or even ordinary.
"We used to have coaches who built a team; who had time in the job to find the way forward. Look at people like Ian Upston in Wellington, Graham Hamer in Manawatu, John Hart in Auckland - look what they achieved," he says.
"I used to coach the Bay of Plenty and I said when I came into the job that it would take me five years to get them into the first division - and I was right. But if a province or a franchise has a bad season these days, that's it. Some coaches are down the river.
"Who's to say that the best coach in New Zealand is not in the third division right now; never getting an opportunity to coach at the elite level? You can't fire the shots if you don't have the ammo, no one can."
Having built international respect by turning out record-breaking, world champion sevens teams, Tietjens has continued to win even though sevens has slid markedly down rugby's priority list. In fact, he has done pretty much what he says coaches can't do. He's kept on firing the shots by finding or making his own ammo.
The figure most often quoted is that the best 300 rugby players in New Zealand are routinely denied to Tietjens because of rugby's new pecking order and the dominance of the World Cup. Tietjens says he hasn't done the math, but he can no longer source players from the country's leading echelons.
All Blacks, Junior All Blacks, NZ Maori players - all gone. Wider training squads are off limits to "Titch", meaning at least 200 Super 14 and fringe players are lost to him. Even those who do well in NPC are snapped up by Super 14 franchises, so he has little option but to select comparative unknowns.
But while most people would unhesitatingly vote Graham Henry as 'Coach of the Year', Tietjens produced a magnificent achievement in coaching the gold medal team at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games with a patchwork side. This month, he won the South African leg of the IRB Sevens World Series with an even lesser-known team. These achie-vements maybe rate ahead of Henry, in terms of pure coaching.
However, even if he were permitted, he is not sure he could choose superstars for sevens - who inevitably go on to All Black assignments. He is not sure he'd be able to recognise them any more.
"If Christian Cullen was coming through the system now, we possibly might not see his skills. I do not know that we would pick up his step, his acceleration, his vision; all the things that made him a great sevens player - and a great fifteens player.
"That's because fifteens now is such a defensive game; you have those giant defensive screens and you now get the wingers taking the ball up like loose forwards."
Sevens, he is saying, gives players like Cullen a stage; room to move; to express themselves and hone those skills and confidence for a higher level. It's important to note there is no criticism inherent there. It's just the way the game has developed. Tietjens makes the point that, with the new priority scale and the way the 15-a-side game is played, its patterns may prevent gems being unearthed.
Add to that there are fewer sevens tournaments and you get a glimpse of the frustration he feels but rarely expresses - and certainly does not do so emotionally. Shouting and waving his arms are not the Tietjens' style unless, of course, you are players in one of his famous gut-busting trainings.
For all who saw it, the gold medal win in Melbourne heightened the emotion of the moment. Tietjens' side had been scraped together without All Blacks and beat an Australian side peppered with Wallabies, including the dangerous and fearsome Lote Tuqiri.
In George, South Africa, the starting team that won the IRB World Series tournament final was full of little-known players handpicked by Tietjens. They beat a blindingly quick home side to win the title. It was a selecting and coaching job of rare distinction.
Read the squad list: Cocker, Forbes, Hoeata, King, Hunt, Lawrence, Munro, Ranger, Pelenise, Raikabula, Thomson, Rickards. Household names? Hardly.
Tietjens smiles tightly when asked how long he can keep winning. It is, he says, getting harder. He places great store on consistency of results - that's what wins world titles.
"But it's not too dissimilar from one-day cricket now. On the day, anyone can win."
It may be that Tietjens is thinking about fifteens again. His contract with the NZRU is up again next year after 12 years of global success. He decided to stay on after that glory-glory win at Melbourne, even though it was to be his sevens swansong.
He answers after a pause, during which he is clearly weighing his words. "I'd have to say I have always had in the back of my mind getting back into 15s. It's what rugby is all about, after all."
This is what leads him into the discussion of the tough life of a coach: "It isn't we who coach the player to put his hands in the ruck and earn the penalty that leads to the kick which loses the game. We don't coach that."
This actually happened to Tietjens when his Bay side fell at the final hurdle and were beaten by Nelson Bays when seeking promotion. It's plain he didn't like the feeling. But since then, he's famous for his attention-to-detail, holistic approach.
Fitness, skill, passion and discipline - down to nutritional nitpicking of every meal his players eat - rub shoulders with his determination to build not just a team but a family.
Young men, sometimes shy, sometimes inexperienced, often religious, are visited at home by Tietjens, who wants to meet their parents.
He explains to the family what he is trying to do; weaving a security blanket but also making it clear that these young men are in good hands overseas. The parents come to training. If Tietjens has to carpet their son because of some failing, he makes sure the parents are in on it. There is no rest for the wrongdoer, even at home.
From all this springs a team and 'family' unit of mutual respect, searing pace and ball skills which goes a long way to explaining why Tietjens' teams continue to win.
This is why it is not hard to picture Tietjens bringing all this to bear on a provincial or even a franchise side some day.
Let's hope so. After all, the alternative is probably retirement - and the thought of Tietjens' teams taking on the opposition in XVs is much more fun to contemplate.
- HERALD ON SUNDAY
