Former Stags captain reconnects with the game he loves
Former Stags captain reconnects with the game he loves
“All things have got to come to an end at some stage, but I was still a bit bitter and wanted to play."
Brayden Mitchell couldn’t bring himself to watch much rugby when he was forced to give up playing a few years back.
Mitchell carved out a decade-long professional career which included Super Rugby stints with the Highlanders, Hurricanes, and Chiefs.
He racked up 50 games for the Southland Stags and spent a couple of NPC seasons with Waikato.
But later in his career, the hooker battled a neck problem which required surgery.
By 2020 he was told that was it. Mitchell had to give the game away because of his neck.
It hurt. Emotionally.
“All things have got to come to an end at some stage, but I was still a bit bitter and wanted to play.
“It was pretty hard, rugby was my life for a long time. When you are young you think you will be doing this for a while, but it flies by pretty quickly.
“All of a sudden you start getting old and start to get sore and all of a sudden it’s gone and you wonder; ‘where did that go?’
“I stepped away from all rugby for two or three years and didn’t even watch much either because I still wanted to play.”
That feeling started to subside and he is now simply grateful he got the opportunities he did while playing rugby.
Last year the 2016 Stags Player of the Year stepped back into a rugby environment, reconnecting with the sport he loves.
The 34-year-old helped the Star Rugby Club’s premier team as an assistant coach.
This year he has stepped into the head coaching role with Star for Southland’s 2024 premier club season.
The 2009 World Under-20 Championship winner wants to see where coaching takes him, but he isn’t making any bold predictions.
“Rugby has been part of my life for so long and I’m really keen to get back into it and do what I can.
“But who knows, I could coach Star this year and things might not go according to plan. It might be the end of my coaching career, so we don’t know yet.”
Mitchell admits to some nerves as he readies himself for his first season in charge of a team.
The former Stags captain has a new-found respect for club coaches after his stint as an assistant last year.
He wasn’t aware just how much of a commitment club coaching was. He felt club rugby coaches probably dealt with more challenges than those in a professional setup.
He said the player pool - in terms of premier club rugby players - was shrinking which meant recruitment was an important and time-consuming task.
Southland’s six premier teams scrap over what is pretty limited playing numbers, he said.
“It’s probably a bigger job than I thought trying to get players to come to your club because that’s just where club footy is at the moment.”
Club players also have to juggle work and family commitments and sometimes were unavailable for trainings and games, at short notice.
It makes planning challenging, Mitchell said.
“If you are a professional coach you know how many people are going to be there [at training] and you can plan accordingly, but [at club level] you have to make do with what you’ve got. That’s a challenge in itself.”
“I don’t want to give the ‘back in my day speech’, but if you didn’t show up to training you weren’t playing, and we had to drop players down to the Bs.
“These days it’s probably the opposite; if you don’t show up to training you probably get a starting position and we are asking the Bs to come fill in on the bench so we can have a team.
“But hopefully that will get better.”
Mitchell also pointed out that players in premier club rugby played for differing reasons.
Some have aspirations to play professionally, while others in the team just want to play footy with their mates and look forward to a beer afterward, he said.
“You’ve got to mold that together as one, it’s a balancing act. But hopefully, I can make it an enjoyable culture where we can work hard and also have fun.”
He’s comfortable with where Star is at as it builds a squad for 2024.
“It’s going to be a good challenge for me, I’m looking forward to it.”
Mitchell will be assisted this season by another former Stags hooker in Greg Pleasants-Tate, and Star veterans Mark McHugh and Callum Rutledge.
He is looking to round out the coaching group with someone to help with the backline.
“I don’t know too much about the backs, but I did spend a bit of time on the wing so I could manage it maybe,” Mitchell joked.
Mitchell is part of the wave of new coaches who were once part of the 2009, 2010, 2011 Southland Stags Ranfurly Shield teams.
James Wilson and David Hall coached the Stags last year, while Matt Saunders is Rugby Southland’s director of rugby.
Scott Eade is Rugby Southland’s academy manager and is a coach on the rise, while Jason Kawau has previously been an assistant coach with the Stags.
Jamie Mackintosh is an assistant coach at the Hurricanes, while Kendrick Lynn has joined the Highlanders as an assistant coach after a successful stint playing and coaching in France.
Jason Rutledge is still playing club rugby, but he too is part of Rugby Southland’s high-performance coaching setup.
Mitchell recently visited good mate and fellow former Stag John Hardie in Scotland.
Hardie is also now coaching. He has taken on a job as a defensive and collision coach with Herriot’s Rugby Club in Scotland.
Herriot’s Rugby Club plays in the Scottish Super Series which is a six-team competition involving part-time players and full-time coaches.
“Me and my partner were over there and went and watched his team. It’s almost a cross between Heartland and [NPC], it was quite good footy to watch,” Mitchell said.
“There’s a lot that has transitioned into coaching. From that ‘09 [Stags] team there’s a lot that went overseas or done their bit playing and have almost gone straight into coaching,” Mitchell said.
Dayna Cunnigham, another former Stags player, has also stepped into a head coaching role for the 2024 Southland club season as he builds his coaching CV.
Cunningham was an assistant coach with the Galbraith Shield-winning Pirates-Old Boys team last year and will be the head coach for its title defence in 2024.
A start date for the 2024 Southland club season has yet to be confirmed.