Rugby trials are like exams says Coach

Written by Justin Faafia
Tuesday, 25 March 2008
Manu Samoa Coach Tuala Niko Palamo Tuala Niko Palamo, the Coach of Manu Samoa has compared rugby trials to university entry exams after the recent selection process of the Manu Samoa squad. “These players need to know that if you go to trial its like sitting exam, in order to go to university you must pass this exam, you can’t just jump straight from Primary School into university,” the Coach said. Last week he along with Samoa Rugby Union officials announced the 36 member training squad for Manu Samoa. Seven of these players joining the Sevens while 29 players will be trained for the Fiji tournament. In an interview with Newsline Lepale spoke about the need for local rugby players to take trials and their choice to play the game seriously. “If I was selecting the team based on all aspects of rugby like an entrance exam, say with English, Maths and other subjects, definitely they pass talent, but they don’t pass fitness, skills which means they won’t pass overall,” he said. “What I am saying is if I was picking the final players now, none of them would make the Manu Samoa team.” However the Coach is not giving up, according to him, this is the challenge faced by the new management of the team. Lazy Players “Samoans have the body composition, talents and skills, the problem is they cannot play 80 minute rugby, they can only play 20 or 30 minutes,” Lepale said. Based on the recent trials, after the first half the players were walking in the second half. Lepale believes that the first thing players need to perfect on is individual awareness, and committing to a lifestyle of a rugby player. “They are not taking it serious enough,” he said. The Coach suggested that local players want the rewards of rugby too fast and are not willing to work to hard to get them. “This is why we are selecting this training squad, so we can perfect and train them before the tournament,” he said. The dream of the new Coach is to see local players make it overseas. “But they have to work for it,” he said. According to Lepale it would be selfish of the local management if they only see winning a cup as a goal. “We want to look at rugby as a career option for our local players, so if at the end of the year we have 50 players contracted to play overseas, then that’s a goal achieved,” he said. Best Players Asked about the preference of the management on origin of players, he said where the players come from do not matter. “We take the best players for the team,” Lepale said. Asked if there was a quota on the number of overseas and local players, he said: “No, if all the best players are overseas, then the whole team will be from overseas.” Comments (1) Subscribe to this comment's feed Rugby Trials. written by Petaia Salesulu, March 29, 2008 Good on you coach. Lets not forget that our team bearing the name of our Beautiful Country. Rugby is a strong physical body contact game, so whoever is selected must be strong in the mind and body and plenty of guts. Its not a 40 minutes game and not an individual sport. Its the Team work so if every 15 players achieve their full potential, there will be no doubt they will succeed. May I suggest that overseas players already have their Contract signed do not put their body on the line because if they get injury they will not get paid by their Club? Write comment Name Email Title Comment
Last Updated ( Monday, 24 March 2008 )

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