Sacked Smith gets Waikato coaching job

Greg Smith admits he was forced to reassess his future involvement in rugby when sacked by Bay of Plenty as their national championship coach last year before the season even started.

But time away from the sport he has been involved in most of his life convinced him he still had the passion for rugby and now he has been signed up as an assistant coach for Waikato, in charge of forward set pieces.

Smith, who played 70 games for Waikato from 1995-2004 and captained Fiji before his playing career was ended by a neck injury, will assist head coach Chris Gibbes alongside other assistant coaches and backs coach Scott McLeod in this year's NPC.

"I am excited about the opportunity and looking forward to being part of the Waikato setup," Smith said.

Smith, who coached Fraser-Tech to a Waikato Breweries Shield premier club title in 2008, after bringing a number of young players through from under-21 level while also being in charge of professional development at the Chiefs, stepped away from rugby following his sacking by the Bay of Plenty Rugby Union in pre-season last year.

He taught physical education at St Paul's Collegiate before moving to Hamilton Boys' High earlier this year as a careers adviser.

"You certainly had to go back and think about the structure of your life and what place rugby had in it," Smith said of the major dent to his career ambitions in rugby.

"I had to think long and hard about that. It also gave me a fantastic learning experience with what I went through and that has positioned me a lot better to take any future opportunity that comes."

Losing the Bay of Plenty job had given him the chance to step away from rugby and "catch my breath and have a think about things".

As a result he decided he still had a burning drive and passion to be involved in a coaching capacity. He bears no grudges over what happened in Bay of Plenty.

"It's all behind me. It's a side of rugby that is an ugly side but I learnt more out of that five months I was in Bay of Plenty rugby than what I have ever learnt as a coach so it was a tremendous learning opportunity."

It was not only a chance to learn the coaching skills required at that level but also the political side involving board members and other stakeholders.

Smith would love to coach Waikato some time in the future but he is taking cautious steps at this stage.

"With the experience I had last year I understand rugby's very fickle but there's an opportunity to do this at this stage and I've just got to make the most of the opportunity that's in front of me.

"Whether it's a career or not it's really hard to gauge in rugby but the opportunity is here now and I'm looking forward to taking it.

"The opportunity for me right now is to be an assistant to Chris, my job is to support Chris and right now that's my primary focus."

In the meantime Smith heads to Japan next Wednesday to spend more than three months as a set-piece coach for the second division Mitsubishi team before returning in June to focus on his Waikato duties with ironically the first competition game against Bay of Plenty.

- © Fairfax NZ News