Mooney wants Reds to play for love

Cosima Marriner
Friday, June 15, 2007

As a youngster, Phil Mooney would tag along with his dad, former Wallaby hooker Paul Mooney, to Ballymore to listen to legendary Queensland coach Bob Templeton explain his coaching philosophy to other club coaches.

Now 41, Mooney has just become a successor to Templeton, Jim Kenny and John Connolly as coach of the Reds. "It's a fantastic responsibility, but it's one I've been eyeing since back to those days as a young boy lying on the floor listening to Bob talk," says the fresh-faced Mooney, who replaced Eddie Jones at Ballymore last week.

A self-confessed rugby tragic, Mooney's ambitions go beyond merely restoring the beleaguered state's winning form. He wants to revive the spirit of rugby he remembers from his boyhood, when the game was played for love not money, and Queensland players were imbued with a sense of tradition.

"Now it's professional, and I realise there are commercial realities to it, but we should never lose the traditions of our game because that's one of the distinguishing features of it," Mooney says.

"As Queensland coach, I'm certainly going to take measures so that the young guys realise that many great players have gone before them, and they've got a massive responsibility every time they step out in that jersey."

Mooney plans to call upon Queensland luminaries such as Tim Horan, John Eales and David Wilson to inspire the next generation of Reds players. "Some of the all-time greats of the code have played for Queensland … they're guys that I watched and admired. I think they're certainly going to help us in terms of our revival."

Mooney also wants to create an atmosphere where his players are first and foremost passionate about rugby. "Once it stops becoming their passion and starts becoming their occupation, then it does become a little bit mundane, and [a complacent] attitude can come through."

It was Mooney's existing connection with many of the Reds players, forged during his time as the world championship-winning coach of the Australian under-19s, that helped secure him the Reds job. A first-grade player for Brisbane club Wests, Mooney switched to coaching the team in 1995. In 2002, he turned professional, running the under-19 program at the Queensland Academy of Sport. He assisted Jeff Millerin coaching the Reds in 2004, before steering the Australian under-19s to victory in Dubai last year.

Although Mooney edged out assistant Wallabies coach Michael Foley for the Reds position, not everyone envies him the task of taking on the Super 14 wooden-spooners. "It's not going to be an easy fix," Mooney acknowledges. "We've got massive room for improvement."

Defence, set pieces and technical skills are key areas Mooney will focus on. But he's also aware that as the Reds' sixth coach in seven years, his players are in dire need of some consistency. "We just need a simple, consistent approach next year, but a game we can build on in the future."

One of Mooney's chief complaints about the current crop of rugby players is their inability to read the game on the field. "I'm always amused that boys have to go to endless meetings, they get told what to eat, what time to be somewhere, what clothes to wear, and then game day the coach sits up in the box with his headset on, running out messages every five minutes," he says.

"To me, if you want people to become good decision-makers, you have to give them a certain amount of responsibility. [By] encouraging them to back themselves and back their instincts, I think that you will see improvement."

Mooney attributes the Reds' dismal season to the loss of players to the Brumbies and the Force, and a horror run of injuries. He now hopes to woo Queenslanders playing interstate back to the Reds. "Two or three players can really transform a side," he says.

The Mooney rugby lineage continues, with Phil's six-year-old son Tom now playing at Wests. But his Kiwi wife, Steph, is not so keen on the rugby culture of the Mooney home, after Tom refused to put on an All Blacks jersey her parents had sent over. "Tom had tears in his eyes, and he was saying to me, 'I only wear Wallabies stuff, Dad,"' Mooney recalls. "That was a very proud moment for me."