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Where’s Our Manu Samoa Heart? |
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Written by Pio Sioa
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Wednesday, 24 October 2007 |
South Africa’s Springboks win the Rugby World Cup. Congratulations to the Rainbow Nation!
England on the other hand was not supposed to be in the final, but all credit to their fighting spirit they did. The former World Champions will certainly relish having rubbed a few doubting noses along the way to defend their title.
For the rest of the rugby playing nations of the world, including Samoa and our beloved Manu Samoa, the long wait for the next World Cup begins.
The agonizing process of rebuilding is underway or should be already.
As far as Manu Samoa is concerned, we came away with our tails down and with several heartbreaking lessons to learn from.
The most crucial is about sustaining the kind of passion and intensity that rattled the designated World Champions in the first 20 or 30 minutes of their opening pool game.
Rugby is a game played for 80 plus minutes, not part of the first half.
Skipper Semo Sititi and his boys slipped from those rarified heights of fierce competitiveness, to a team simply going through the motions for the rest of their World Cup campaign.
Tsk tsk tsk. Where and when did we lose our do or die fire that should have been burning in the depths of our indomitable spirits?
Skills and talents will take you far and win you matches, but the fight in the heart determines the quality of what you have won.
The Manu Samoa of old, deservedly won the admiration of the world not by winning on the score board, but as a minnow with the guts of a fighting Champion – that ladies and gentlemen is what real victory is?
We have tasted that in all the Rugby World Cups we have been in, except this one in France!
Coach Michael Jones has shouldered the blame and stepped down. We must however accept with clean conscience that he should not be the only one to carry the whole weight of the Manu Samoa’s torturous performance.
It should be shared around to the whole coaching staff and the players.
Maybe the blame should filter down to the Samoa Rugby Union Board as well.
This was the best organised World Cup campaign by a Manu Samoa team. The players were better exposed to a build up of pre-world cup matches to harden them up and to gel as a team.
The team was properly outfitted and virtually lacked for nothing in their preparations.
Why then did this not reflect on the field where it all counted? Maybe they were over pampered they lost the hunger to win.
The mighty Papali’i Fatialofa’s answer to our downfall is more money to be paid to the players. Hogwash! …and more hogwash Mr. Fats!
Why did the team you led in 1991 made all of us proud with the display of guts, yet all they got were pennies compared to what these guys got or were already getting?
The search for a new Manu Samoa coach is on and whoever that maybe, man, woman fa’afafine or whatever, it is time we turn a new leaf in the selection of players.
We need players with the heart of a Brian Lima. Fiercely loyal and willing to lay everything on the line when called upon to serve
What is the point of selecting a named player in the professional ranks from half way around the world, if their loyalty is to professional contracts?
Give them the axe! Time we look to our own locally bred players. What they may lack in experience and size they will more than make up for in the heart.
We need the hearts of people like Keneti Sio when he was on the reserve bench in 1991 crying out to his teammates to take his heart if it will help?
We need players who treasure so deeply the honour of wearing the colour of the Manu Samoa, sacrifice comes before safety.
Players like the late Asora Simanu who will dive to win the ball while Fijian boots were flying at the ball maybe thought of as reckless, but it is what ticks inside that the new Manu Samoa coach should look at.
The skills will come later, and that is the job of the Board of Directors and all the others who do the lobbying work for Samoa.
It is their job to win a firm bridging platform for local players to be able step up closer to the international standards of playing. We do not have to be rocket scientists to know that already.
The offer of places for players from Samoa, Fiji and Tonga in the Super 14 next year is a step in the right direction.
The politics of sports will always be there! In that case maybe we should stick with the PM as Chairman of the Board. He is our top politician so maybe we should let him stay for a while to play at what he does best.
He is our Robin Hood so he should have a sharper eye for opportunity in the political circuit.
There should however be a complete overhaul of our Manu Samoa coaching staff.
It is time we clear this irritating misconception that you have to be a star player to coach. There is more to coaching that having natural rugby playing talents.
There are three main qualities that separates a good coach from an exceptional coach. First is the ability to instill discipline in the players. Second the ability to properly motivate the players. Third the ability to read and analyse the strengths and weaknesses in his team and of the opposing side.
You need more than a star rugby player for that?
Rugby is like any other sport? To be successful one should always lead with the head and then the heart. The balance is critical.
Our Manu Samoa in France led with their heads, but they left behind their hearts.
If we can not have that balance when the next World Cup comes around, maybe we should take up hula hoop or go wriggle our backside somewhere else.
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i think tongans and sam...
