Mark Hammett on deck with the Makos
Tasman Makos assistant coach Mark Hammett.
There's no place like home.
The Tasman Makos' new assistant rugby coach Mark Hammett is now enjoying some relative calm after what's been a hectic and sometimes harrowing coaching gig with Japan's Sunwolves in the Super Rugby competition.
Hammett began his new Tasman appointment late last week and admitted that it's been nice to finally settle back into some familiar rugby territory.
"I've just been living in a jet-lagged land for the last seven months, so it's quite nice," Hammett said.
Predictably, it was a testing debut season for the Sunwolves in which they recorded just one win and a draw from 15 games.
"You can debate whether the Sunwolves or the Jaguares should be in there, that's not really for me to judge. I took on the challenge around [the Sunwolves being] desperate in terms of getting Super Rugby fit, and I'm not just talking about the on-field, I'm talking about the management, travel - everything that goes with Super rugby, which is huge.
"They were basically brand new, so that was a challenge for me to see what we could do. They batted way above where they should have ultimately so I learned a lot out of it...they did as well.
"Look, it was enjoyable, there's still a lot of work to do to keep going, but from a personal perspective, I enjoyed it immensely."
It's easy to overlook the fact that being based in Tokyo, the Sunwolves were forced to endure one of the competition's more rigorous travel schedules, which included regular travel to South Africa and occasionally to Singapore.
Hammett said that he hoped to translate that to Tasman's situation where short week turnarounds were now an integral part of the national provincial championship.
"One of the biggest challenges we had was [determining] how do we get our biggest bang for our buck in terms of through our trainings and through our review side of things and I think with the Mitre 10 Cup, you have an element of that. So if there's anything I hope to bring to this environment is just some of the things we learned around that."
Despite often negative media feedback, Hammett was satisfied that he'd helped to establish a framework for the future.
"It's easy to have an opinion without understanding what goes on on the inside.
"At the beginning, there was a thought, even from the Japanese, that they might be lucky to get within 60 or 70 points of any team all year. And all of a sudden, they had a win, they had a draw and they had three games that they lost by less than four or five points.
"They scored three or four tries per game. So from the perspective of how the team actually went, they batted well above where they should have."
As for Tasman, Hammett's already feeling comfortable in his new environment.
"There are a lot of guys pretty close to taking that next step so that's been really pleasing," he said.
"I'm just starting to get to know the players and build those relationships and that takes time, but it's been good."
Hammett served an an assistant at the Crusaders from 2007-10 and was head coach at the Hurricanes from 2011-14 before taking up the director of rugby role at the Cardiff Blues (2014-15). He also has 81 caps to his name at the Crusaders where he played from 1996-2003 and 29 for the All Blacks throughout a test career spanning four years.
