Tana Umaga is ready for the scrutiny and pressure that comes with the Blues coaching job. Photo / Jason Oxenham
Tana Umaga is ready for the scrutiny and pressure that comes with the Blues coaching job. Photo / Jason Oxenham
Tana Umaga faces a mammoth task in resuscitating the Blues, but Gregor Paul believes he can do it.
Given the obvious scale of problems in the Blues, it's possibly ridiculous to suggest that within 30 minutes of being unveiled as the new head coach, Tana Umaga gave hope he is equipped to fix the franchise.
But somehow, against the backdrop of 12 long, miserable years, Umaga gave hope that mediocrity and under-performance may become the Blues' past. This broken franchise could be mended by a man who has obviously been watching intently from afar. Umaga, on day one in the role, had a better handle on the root cause of the chronic playing deficiencies than Sir John Kirwan managed to develop in three years.
Perhaps that's cruelly deriding Kirwan's coaching abilities, but the real intention is to highlight the sharpness and accuracy of Umaga's analysis and find in that reasons to be optimistic that he can pull off the seemingly impossible.
A 14th-place finish this year and only two away victories in the last three seasons - it's a long road to recovery for the Blues. But maybe they can travel a fair way down it on the back of nothing more than simple messages from the coach and clarity over core roles.
"To be honest, watching our players play, I thought our players worked hard," says Umaga about what he saw from the Blues this season.
"I suppose sometimes they weren't clear enough in their direction. There were times I thought when they shouldn't have been working so hard in certain parts of the field, but that was just a game management thing. Those key areas of No 9, 10 and 15 are crucial in understanding that and that is an area of concern for us.
"Until I am involved and can understand the players and know what their processes are through game management and their game sense I won't know. But I don't think hard work is an issue.
"From what I saw, because a lot of guys weren't having any communication they thought, 'I'll just keep doing something'. So there was maybe a little bit of overworking, and because no one else was saying anything they kept doing it.
"If you have got players who are willing to work hard and go above and beyond, then what we have to make sure is that they are doing it in the right place. I don't think work ethic is a problem."
Tana Umaga: "We will notice the talented players but we will test their work ethic, test their willingness to sacrifice for the team's sake." Illustration / Rod Emmerson
Umaga isn't going to trust that he's right with that assumption. He wants to be sure he's right because this whole business of work ethic is at the heart of the Blues' woes.
Talent identification, player development, retention and recruitment have been areas the Blues have got right only sporadically, and rarely have they managed to tick all four boxes.
The board has a vision that 85 per cent of the squad will come from within the region. That could be considered a conservative goal, as the Blues region contains more than a quarter of all registered players in New Zealand.
But it's a goal that factors in the intensity of competition for the region's players and the inescapable reality that between the NRL, other New Zealand Super Rugby teams, Australian Super Rugby teams, European rugby clubs and the AFL, the Blues aren't going to be able to keep all their players.
The critical part is that they at least manage to keep all the players they want, and that they make sure the ones they want are the best equipped to succeed.
This weekend was testament to Kirwan's failings in accurate assessment of his talent pool. He couldn't see much in Malakai Fekitoa or Waisake Naholo, and yet they are the two most dangerous Highlanders backs in tonight's semifinal against the Waratahs and have journeyed from Blues reject to the All Blacks.
Umaga isn't likely to make that same mistake and neither is he likely to be seduced by any young player on the basis they can step and score a few tries.
"It is great having the most talented players," says Umaga, "but unless they are willing to make the shifts in terms of preparation, self-reliance and sacrifice for the team you have got to ask yourself how long do you persevere?
"What I have learned is that you can only try to help people so long before they have to realise that it is actually up to themselves. And it is about how we do that. The most talented don't necessarily make the best rugby players.
"Talent gets you noticed, it gets you a foot in the door, and what I have realised and what people will always tell you is that it is work ethic after that which will get you to the next level.
"We will notice the talented players but we will test their work ethic, test their willingness to sacrifice for the team's sake. Those are the things we will have to look for because those are the things that make successful teams."
There was a haphazard vibe throughout the Kirwan reign, a sense - especially when Benji Marshall turned up for a few months - that things were being made up as he went along. Umaga is not one for whims and fancies. His coaching is based on planning, analysis and attention to detail, and no one should underestimate how much thought he's already put into next season.
As assistant with the New Zealand Under-20s, he was given a close look at the next generation of emerging talent - eight of whom are from the Blues region - and he liked what he saw.
"They definitely excite me," he says. "Having been a part of that team [NZ Under-20s] and then going through the process of getting this job, that did kind of warm me up a bit knowing we have those guys coming through.
"Will they create the core [of the Blues squad next year]? They will be part of it, but they are still young men and as we are starting to learn about Super Rugby - not like it was in my day - it is similar to the European season where it is a long process and there are times when you have to grind.
"Having young guys go through that is a big ask, so you still need your experienced players to help them along."
Considered decision-making is going to be the core tenet of the Umaga regime. He took his time in determining whether he was ready for this job. He will take his time to appoint his wider coaching team and he will take time to get to know his players.
There won't be random jumps in thinking or populist ideas tried one week and ditched the next. Selection will stop being a lottery, players will know where they stand and in Umaga, they will find a fair and consistent coach who will do exactly what he said he would do.
Just as importantly, Umaga is ready for the scrutiny and pressure that comes with the job. Auckland is the centre of its own little universe and the Blues are an endless source of fascination to a public that has grown to almost revel in their decline.
He's been All Black captain so he knows all about expectation and pressure. He's lived much of his life in the public eye, and while he says he hasn't missed the scrutiny and goldfish bowl aspects of that in the past few years, he is ready to accept the intrusion again.
"I'm ready," says Umaga. "I know what I am letting myself in for, but I'm prepared for that. I'm more than aware of what it is going to take.
