Rugby: Johnstone knuckling down to new job as a miracle-worker

By WYNNE GRAY

The day after masterminding Italy's stunning Six Nations rugby debut, coach Brad Johnstone was a special guest on a television soccer programme.

While the country's newspapers ran reports of the nation's stunning conquest of Scotland, television was not geared up to accommodate the oval-ball sport.

So Johnstone, the former All Black prop called on to rejuvenate Italian rugby fortunes after his rescue mission with Fiji, had to explain rugby's triumph during gaps in the traditional Sunday soccer programme. It was a bit-part operation, a reflection of rugby's style and place in Italian sporting life.

"There is a very different culture in rugby over here," Johnstone said. "It is modelled on the soccer scene and we have a huge problem for a start between clubs' agendas and international agendas.

"Clubs rule the national team. They call the shots and we battle the same thing in rugby."

Johnstone used the case of former All Black utility Craig Green as an example of the clubs' reluctance to assist the national rugby cause.

"I had told the Italian union I wanted Craig to assist me and he came to the first camp we had, but when I wanted him for the next, his club pulled him out because the Six Nations was going to interfere with his club training sessions.

"That sort of attitude will not change for a fair while."

Johnstone should know. It has altered little since he was coaching the L'Aquila club in the late 1980s.

Rugby appeared to have been stagnant since those days when Johnstone had Frano Botica, Mike Brewer and Joel Stransky as guest players in his teams.

"Being invited into the Six Nations looks to be the first progress they have made for a long time," the new coach said. "And that win against Scotland and getting rugby on to the front page of the papers is really a miracle."

Getting the victory against the reigning champions Scotland was the real miracle, no matter how badly the visitors had played at Stadio Flaminio. After winning acceptance into the competition a while back, Italy had been in a slump.

"We were [in Italy] last August with Fiji and the whole environment round the Italian national team was so negative. You could see they thought it was no use going to the World Cup because of the pool they were in," Johnstone said.

On his arrival this year, Johnstone knew his first task was to rekindle the enjoyment and enthusiasm levels in the national side.

He also brought a few rules: injured players who did not train would not play, but they had to attend practice rather than skulk back to their clubs where they might suddenly recover.

With no system to coordinate players, no pyramid to help the players get to the top, Johnstone knows he will have to work as hard in the office as he does on the training paddocks.

"Nothing happens here by order in rugby. It is more by mistake than good management and that is something we are all going to have to work hard to turn around.

"The greatest thing I have been working on with the players is their mental attitude and teaching them to play under pressure for extended periods of time. They have not been used to that."

Two factors worked for Johnstone last weekend in tuning his team to play Scotland.

"I had the fact that Italy were virtually a disgrace at the World Cup and many of the players were hurting from that image, and the second was that most of Britain for the last three months had been talking about Italy not being worthy of playing in the competition."

Johnstone, his wife and two teenage daughters live in an apartment in the northern suburbs of Rome about a mile from Stadio Flaminio.

Coaching in Italy is different from his work in New Zealand or Fiji.

"They are not motivated by the same things here. There is a lot of grey area here all the time. Eventually you get to the answer or solution, but often you have to go the long route to get there. Patience is a huge virtue."

Johnstone accepts that he will need plenty of that during his two-year contract.

What happens to him he does not know but the former prop, who turns 50 halfway through this year, wants to coach for some time yet.

In New Zealand at Super 12 level or maybe the All Blacks? Johnstone would like to come home but is unsure of his prospects under New Zealand Rugby Football Union rules which have barred coaches such as Graham Henry from the All Black job.

"This job came out of the blue and I grabbed it. Sure, there was talk about the All Black job last season but I felt I was outside the box because I had not been through the system. This was a challenge to take. It is a career move.

"Rugby is my passion. I love the way New Zealand plays rugby and would relish being involved, but right now I've got a heck of a lot of work to do here."

Like Wales in Cardiff next weekend, Johnstone v Henry.