Stormers' Norman Laker & Seabelo Senatla on Building the Best Defence in Europe | Lekker Rugby Pod

Look, I'm gonna be honest. The last three games, Konacht, Ulster and Kader won our best. 15 tries in three games. So it could have been a lot better if you concede. We only concede 2.

7 per game. And Tux, Alouzette and Tuna, made a tackle in the first 30 seconds from a line-out. And then he sat down and held his arm. So I shouted, Tuchs stand up, Tuchs stand up! I saw them coming back on the blind.

Tuchs we need you! He looked at me, Garm's broken! It was quite frustrating because I prepped for the other Flav because this guy wasn't in the mix. So the guy that I prepped for is a guy that played for Wales against South Africa and obviously got some good info from some of the Springbok guys knowing how to deal with him and this guy rocks up on the team sheet. I mean, some people use it obviously to fool themselves, but we must make sure that we're not overtaken by it.

We must get back to say, hey, we have a quarterfinal, we're playing at home in front of our fans. We have potential of, you know, making it all the way. This is the Lekker Rugby Pod, only on Megaphone Rugby. Welcome Lekker Rugby Pod viewers. 340,000 of you have been watching this series side by side.

we've seen Dobbo and Dion go full emo we've seen Rita and BJ building rugby scaffolding we've seen captain Ruan and Dave Sleiman talking about the surprising fate of being in a Stormer's attack we've had Brock and Sandy fooling up the whole screen with their shoulders and then we had Immy and Gareth dispelling fear today we're talking about something that's very near and dear to us us as stormers guys is the defense defense never rests you see those trials where the defense says now the defense rests now the defense never rests and Somerset West strand uh in Cape Town the blue and white hoops are all about you uh we're gonna say a very special welcome today to the man from welcome uh Cibelo Sanatla Cibelo welcome back to the pitch hopefully as soon as possible thank you much it's good to be back and good to be chatting to you guys as well here and to your right shoulder to shoulder is um the madman norman laker the d in defense and all action gymnast who portrayed himself you know where am i from uh review the sword pe he's probably a bank robber to be honest about but then he lost the money i think he lost i think he lost the money and it was spent at all but he's he's actually from somerset west uh a vp man from all the way back also yeah and also there's actually a statue in sri lanka i understand uh that that has you uh based on you or something he's coached all over the world he's been also a fly off on a number 12 for paul rus so yes rugby pedigree he is the man he's a very loud coach he's the loudest coach that was that's ever been measured his decibels are off the charts and most of the time cibelo you'll confirm this he's yelling, Tables! How's it going? Yeah, 100%. Tables, Hunt! That's nutty!

So far, Allah! So, Norman, you're sitting on top of the best defense in the IRC, as we call it. The most important measure, of course, is tries conceded, 2.7, conceding less than 19 points a game, denial of entry into the 22, and not many phases run against the Stormers before, a jackal but norman i know that you probably preach something more like spirit and will and commitment talk to me about how you got your guys to be uh the most stubborn defense in new york yeah look i'm gonna be honest uh the last three games gone out um ulster and carter weren't our best 15 tries in three games so it could have been a lot better if you if you consider we only concede 2.7 per game so if we stuck to that then we would have had a much better record but yeah i I must give credit to the guys.

We've changed up one or two things from last season, going into the season. Everyone brought nicely into the plan and we went with it. Obviously, there were a few bumps that we had to get over. A few guys disagreed. But to get to an agreement is always nice.

And then, obviously, the first game after the preseason, getting the $35 against Leinster just proved what we did in the offseason. It's going to be, can take us through the season. So, yeah. But I'm going to go to the guys to buy into one of the new changes. I mean, obviously, if we had some success in the previous years, two finals, two quarterfinals, guys are stubborn sometimes to change, but everyone took it with arms wide open.

And yeah, we went with it. Norman, it looks like to me the defense pinches more. You've been trying to get the guys to the point where everything is choked at source, you know, so things don't even develop. And then, like you say, in Cardiff, they found the edge. There were things that happened in the Cardiff game that didn't look like anything else in the season.

So talk to me about that and how you plan to choke that off and make sure there's not tram-running edge tries. Look, the play is kind of the quality outfit. I mean, it's half of the Welsh international team. And I've said it numerous times in interviews. This competition has developed so far from year one and two afterwards.

Now, there's no such thing as a weak team. I mean, if you think you're going to play Zebra in Parma on a Saturday or Friday evening, it's going to be an easier game than you like yourself. And that's supposed to be here once. Weak team. And they've beaten Munster.

They came close beating Leinster. So, yeah, getting back to Cardiff. They were also in the bottom teams at the start. and we've played them once over here. Last we played them here since then.

We had three games in Cardiff, so three out of five. And yeah, to play on the Cardiff 4G is quite tough, especially defensively. Their carry height was quite low to our knees, so we couldn't get our trademark doubles. But that only works on 4G. You're unable to get that right on grass, I think.

that's my assumption is that right word perfect cbello you you played sevens and so you probably played in all kinds of surfaces talk to me a little bit about 4g this is something that's coming up more and more in the irk uh with some of the welsh and scottish teams having 4g what how does that play out differently for for you as a player looking at defense from the outside in from wing well i think most teams especially in europe uh choosing to go hybrid because of weather um and it makes sense you know it's more sustainable for them to have you know synthetic cross um i like it per se because i get to be extremely quick on the pitch and it seems like i'm a little bit faster than usual so it's it's too much advantage in that ride but what normally is talking to here is you know from a forest perspective it's hard to kind of like stop someone in their tracks right then then because of the let's call it slit it has like a nice you know momentum type of build when you especially when you're going you know pretty low you know you get momentum pretty quickly so for us defensively that's tough to stop on the outside it doesn't make too much of a difference because we can move freely and the ball flies there so it's not i think it's more towards the fourth front rather than us um they can't asset themselves nicely just because the guys are going extremely low uh so they're getting more momentum and we can't sit then which is always tough you know if you're going back back on the defense um you're not gonna stop anybody and obviously it makes our lives a little bit time as well at the edge because that means you can't get back and get up into the face that we like doing a little bit of beat a little bit there. So I think that's why they got around us quite a lot is because of those little subtleties that they got to actually impose on us which is great in them but like Noman says it's a little bit different on girls. Yeah it's I mean added to think our game against Holster um our 38-31 79 minutes We came from the halfway line, marched them for 50 meters all the way. Because us got a high shot, we got a penalty try. But that just proves how our dominant attacking team can be on 4G.

And our weak, not weak, but our vulnerable defenses can be on 4G as well. If you're just clever with ball in hand. Norman, just something you mentioned just now. Their carry height is lower. Now, I'm not a rugby expert like you guys.

What does that mean exactly? How does that work? why is it why is such a big thing on 4g specifically so i'm gonna explain to you so if someone carries towards your knees like this is my knees then we can't defend this to to get under them and be dominant in that collision and take them back so that what sabella said so that we can get the jump so we can be in the faces again and it's it's an old saying momentum before quick ball or quick ball before momentum and they clearly is going quick ball before momentum even if they just gets one or two meters then the ball's out so you hardly gets time to sit defensively or to have a proper tackle fight and slow the ball down because that's also when we we put and we call it studs in the ground so whenever we play in 4g we want studs in the ground defensively to get that to get that grip but that's a similar similar thing with the attack ones um the most starts so i pass the ball to shabella grab onto him and i push him then it's quite a lot of studs in the ground i mean that yeah he he talked about starts in the ground right like when you're playing in 4g and you're moving forward like the guys are shooting almost to the knees you can't get a sending service and take them back that means you guys probably won't see it on on television but they are getting pieces of momentum and for us that's like seconds so if you're getting a second on me on attack that means I can't sit that makes me a little bit slower to get off the line because I have to go back and then go forward again so it makes a huge difference it might be really technical things that we're talking about here but it makes a massive massive difference I mean like if you can go forward if we can't put our stars on the ground and take you back that means we're going backwards the whole time and yeah that splits again I promise you makes a huge difference between attack and defense because that means the attack is running onto the ball and defense has to be passive. So the carryout is a decision that they made to carry lower than normalists because nothing to do with the 4G is like Glasgow decided to tackle a bit higher than anybody else for example that's not something to do with 4G it's how Cardiff plays on the 4G. Yeah it's strategic and in the world.

Well done for them I mean it was a great plan they haven't done it. Obviously because we were big and strong. And Cornille also knows us, so he probably knew what defensive strategy we'll use. So to get away from it, you need to go carry it in the eye. It's a bit like playing on a frozen pond.

The ball bounces really high, but also if they get you going, it's really hard to stop it. That also plays well for malls, though. saw some of those mauls running for the Stormers, taking Cardiff 15 meters, you know, wasn't finished off, but still the maul can get going as well. Yeah, sorry, that's exactly the point. Studs in the ground.

The moment the ref tells two of them, get out of the maul, then we have more studs in the ground than you go. So just be patient. So obviously when you're looking at stats as a defensive coach, there's all kinds of things to look at. I always thought it's a strange game in one way, because we play both ways. It's the ball, you know, you never can say I'm an attack player or defensive player.

I'm both. You know, obviously, Isabella, you're really good at that example, getting stuck in as a wing. But, you know, there's some sports like the NBA and basketball. They actually have an all-defensive team every year. I think it's the first and second.

They keep stats like shot blocking, steals, denial, plus minus. I mean, they revere defensive players. And everyone knows who the best defensive players are. in rugby it's almost like all our stats that that fans get is attack stats you know and then other than tackles you know dominant tackles but it's not like you know really uh you know some guys like paul de villiers or branis i mean unbelievable geniuses at defense um one thing i've one stats i thought about is besides dominant tackles and and maybe um you know the jackling is time on the floor like for me give me a defensive player that doesn't it's not on the floor very long How much time does he spend on the floor? How much time can he get up?

Norman, have you devised a way to measure that? Where you don't stay down, get up, get back in. That's my voice. That's where my voice comes in. We played at Connacht, I think.

and Tux, Alouzette and Tuna, made a tackle in the first 30 seconds from a line out. And then he sat down and held his arm. So I shouted, Tux, stand up! Tux, stand up! And I saw them coming back on the blind.

Tux, we need you! He looked at me. My arm's broken! And then I ran past him. It was obviously a water break because of his arm.

And then he carried on playing. as it took i thought your arm's broken that felt like it but yeah no look i took that one he could sit because his arm was broken but for the rest of the guys we actually do have a stat it's called an a nuisance stat uh after you've tackled what you create um at the at the breakdown um what did you do so um if if your nuisance stat is low then obviously you spend quite a lot of time on the ground if the nuisance stat is high and effective then you haven spent a lot of time on the ground so we always strive to get 14 guys on our feet at least um and lose one guy that do a proper job at the breakdown so below this i mean this in the best possible way uh you are a great nuisance when i watch you play rugby uh you're always trying to find a way to get in uh you're not one of those passive wingers waiting for um an overlap to score i mean you're really getting in what is that from uh who taught you to be tough and where did you get your fire yeah that's a that's a complex question and i can't attest it to you know one variable to be very honest with you it's it's a mixture of stuff um going straight from where i come from and my journey and then straight into my early years as a pro um and coming into you know developing into the player that i am today it's it's been a journey long um type of acquisition where you know these sort of things you acquire as you move but in in terms of work rates and attitude i think that's something that you know i've always had um as a kid is to i think the challenge for me was to always try to i don't know calm it down or use it to great use and not be over eagle all the time you know know when to use it and when not not youtube and that's that's been the story of kind of like my life now it's different because of how we play an attack with the stormers i need to be you know widened and create the worth for the guys to actually play into that space so we're not encouraged to actually come in but then i get to do different sets of work on my defensive player you know where i get to be the nuisance that no one is talking about i'm not a passive gamer like you said you know i like being on the ground i like racking i like stealing ball i'm always active within those spaces so it depends how the team needs me on the day and how we're trying to play the uh or rugby that we're trying to play but i'm always trying to search for opportunities on both sides of the ball uh where i can impose myself and i can making the first first time coming down the stretch uh sibella that i thought i thought oh i wish bella was in because it looked like fractured play that you would enjoy you know where the ball's bouncing you have that knack of knowing where the egg-shaped ball is going to land uh yeah norman speak to me a little bit about that about what sibella just said yeah look one thing that um i'm quite blessed with is him uh siabella rwan now daniel duplassi Daniel Bilimsa and Warwick Zas obviously has been with me for quite a long time and myself and St.Pelo since 2017 next year will be our 10-year reunion. But so we've built, so we came from hard line speed, no connection, just making reads back in the day because people didn't know how to attack against the 2017-2018, then got to Super Rugby 2019, uh some of the little bit down a bit more connection then 2021 again going into europe fly off the line because felt no one not how to attack against it and it's something new everything's everyone in europe has line speed but they actually only have lines between the two 15s i'm talking about back then but in the 50s they will back off so we said we're flying all the way by pressure and obviously here three and four people got knew how to attack against us so maybe car have the move or two it's got us or clement remove that beat us um i think the one nice thing is having these eyes with me for such a long time that you can actually experiment with stuff in training it will tell me no it's not gonna work i promise you um let's let's cut it oh no this is a great plan let's go with it um but if we didn't have such a good relationship he probably wouldn't have had the courage to tell me norman's not gonna work or i'll tell him okay your plan is actually better than mine let's go with your plan um and then coming into this season that's where he played a massive role although he was injured of the first five games but the first five games set us nicely on but that has helped us tremendously defensively i'm an experienced guy like him knowing what i expect of them and also the guys on his inside and allowing them to to have a bit more freedom on the edges to apply pressure onto the teams within the system yeah defense is is also attack sabella you can go from a from defense to attack in one second as well yeah the transitions are very important and i think whoever gets the city in rugby is the guys that transition better than the other team because like i said the same sort of conversation earlier about you know defense with the forwards and getting momentum split seconds if we can get a this place I can do with a team, you can catch the man away. And, you know, I like that type of chaos.

You know, that's where I thrive. I get to be instinctual, which is how I prefer to play rather than robotic. And I can do my thing, you know, being what I see in front of me. So that's great. I was trying to talk to Norman's point about this perspective that we kind of like built over the years, it is so important because I get to understand what he's trying to achieve, right?

And how he's trying to impose himself. Sometimes that application might be a little bit different from what he sees, but because he understands what he's trying to achieve from whatever situation, I can just apply myself and see what teams are doing on the field and try to execute it best because that's what we kind of like built which is so good um and it just takes years and years of getting to know each other to be able to build that type of trust and and understanding i mean like sometimes on the pitch i'll do something he'd say something to me and i'm just like no more relaxed about this and i think it's something totally different but it's just years and years of seeing different pictures of working together and understanding what you're trying to achieve there's a lot of ways to get there right there's not one way and i guess like my experience comes in nicely there where i can read certain pictures and still get the same result but doing it a little bit different um yeah but he trusts me for that i'm super grateful that's what you want as a player you know you you work with someone and you build that trust during the week i always say there's a lot of time for coaches during the week but on game day it's it's me you know trust me because we are who would have done the work leading up to that and that's that's very important there's no way to learn about a man that's better i think than being on the line defending your own line tackling tackling uh you saw you know you're hurting that's for later you get stuck in it's you and your brother um and this type of thing builds bonds that are deep you might find later in life uh it's hard to find that you know you'll miss the locker room you'll miss the change room you miss you miss the tackling and um but it's brutal talk to me a bit about the comms though this you've you just mentioned a bunch of guys uh that are all really good talkers on the field and especially in defense from the outside in you know looking from 13 in and seeing what's happening developing the wing talking to the 13 um getting getting cues from each other it's fights on that norman you have someone's got to be shouting and you've got to hear it over the day yeah look certain players always goes like this it makes if it doesn't yeah and then sometimes if you do that then it's like that i don't know which one you act it out yeah no look the comms is really important and um i will always use the 15 or or the winger that's closest to me especially at the hl stadium when it's really like 50 15 000 people he can be 20 he'll always hear me or at least know when I try him from the other side. So I'll speak to Warwick or Damien and he'll just give me a thumbs up because then the message will get relayed to Rohan and it's important for the team's communication as well. But it's more important for me that the guys that are defending around the ball and that the immediate space communicate well with each other. rely on these jokes to make sure we're onside and and and the the small negative stuff that that makes you successful it's kind of like we we talked about the 13s and the wingers right we're the first of the last so we can hear them but it's important that we kind of become the mini coaches within the team you know normally shouting from the outside we are shouting at that guys you know giving instructions on the inside because that's very important we need to be aligned at all times i mean there's so many situations where we've had let's call it right and i'm playing next to one and he shoots out right in that moment i can either think whether i think it's right or wrong you know i have to go with him because it's all about connection it's about you know having my man's back and most of the time he made the wrong way but because i'm there with him it suddenly works out So it's about communicating and also just like trusting the guys inside you to also give them the freedom because you all want freedom at the end of the day.

You want to be playing outside of the box. You want to be playing in a way that we can impose ourselves on the game. So it's about trusting them as when they see something. It's like, okay, he sees something. Instead of thinking it's right or wrong, it doesn't matter.

you know at that point in time the most I mean commendable thing for lack of a better word is to go with him and most of the time I promise 910 times whatever he sees I'm gonna capture from that I've had so many intercepts like that so many would run his goal in and think oh my god I have to go too didn't necessarily think it's the right decision but I just went with him because he went he saw something and someone just feels like a quick little no look at pause because he feels the pressure and i get them to say so that connectivity is so important and it's birthed through not just the years of playing together but also communication i mean if i have someone like paul de villiers in the middle of the line i know your call we have we have a jackal like a branas we have a jackal in the middle i can go up as hard as i can to make sure that when the team looks up he sees me right i'm already in this place he comes through the ball he hesitates um they tackle him there we have an opportunity to get a check off so it's about knowing who's way and communicating what would the people i love i love that that's just a great game within the game yeah yeah i'm saying there is i'm saying like we're mini coaches because we really i have a defense group on what's up and um oh doesn't matter what the name is um but uh there's a there's a few i want to know what the name is i want to know what the name is so i always have a six um and then the nines and then 12 and 13 and a wing or a 15 in in that group because those guys are guys that can actually impose the system from the edges and i need to understand from a six perspective what what these things from the forwards and pranas and and and and uh and police clever guys so it's easy to collaborate with them in a pack of force if they tell me listen it's not going to work i'll listen to them um but which is which is quite nice um in that regard i just want to go back to cibeli you mentioned transitions just now and we're speaking to kennedy timber tonight he's done a study for world rugby on transitions um explain to me what is what is it what does it mean because i know people are saying it's defense and attack but transition is the future but i have no idea what it really means so if you maybe can explain that to me language i can understand you you're going you're going deep um i guess like let's talk about rugby point of view um from a rugby point of view transitions is not just about attack and defense transitions can also mean uh kicking circles you know in in your c1 i think the the thing that we got the most success out of was exactly that kick cycles we used to kick so much and people kick back to us and we knew that we have you know the tools to actually unlock defenses on the kicking game. So we created transitions, then created the chaos. We kind of like probably because we had people that could play to the ball like myself, like the Wariks, the Malis, the Ruans, we have people that could create something out of nothing. So we understood if we can fabricate some sort of chaos within structure, we have a beautiful chance of scoring unbelievable trials. And that's what happened.

We scored trials from anywhere. you know whether it's running your back or kicking it they kick it back we kick it back they kick it back we put up another we win the ball there or we make it scrappy there the ball turns out somewhere somebody takes it and we move the ball from there it was all about creating the chaos because we were geared to operating the case we had i mean people like archiva playing wing with me at times you're standing next to me all the time yes those are people that play off the cuff and we could do stuff like that because we had those type of people around so transitions is not necessarily about moving from defense to attack transitions is basically going from play to play and trying to get the better of each situation that comes through whether it's whether it's scrum to first phase or whether it's kick circles, whether it's contesting the air ball bounces the scrum. So it's whoever gets the in-betweens, let's call it the in-betweens. Whoever gets the in-betweens right is gonna ultimately win the game because those small moments create the big moments that are perfect to actually win you the big moments well something i seen you know with the bulls and everything is how structured rugby is and now you keep mentioning chaos chaos chaos i mean that's moving away almost from that isn't it why is chaos so important now you said you must we must go to transitions in a deeper sort of format so that's that's what i'm trying to create yeah it's black and white you practice black and white and then the game has lots of gray um so starter plays and phases of structure but in reality we just saw board though dismantle leinster leinster was very programmatic and bordeaux was living for the scuffed kick the the ball off the knee the the bouncing i mean they were just ready for it and they were ready to go you know they're all systems go right absolutely absolutely it's about it's about being aware for anything that can happen um and that's i think for me that's the national of the type of rugby that i want to be playing i want to be playing here's a rugby if you can equate it to something of a simpler nature i'd call it i don't know touches not even like offset touch would be like a a replicator of that it's almost like playing in this non-structural you know fun like game where we're just moving the ball and we're just getting into spaces you know turnovers turnover we do it quickly people can offload people who can just react it's about reacting uh more than anything I saw you guys play almost a soccer game together in PE. It was like a replication of soccer.

You could pass the ball forward, but there was a goal and, you know, like BJ was the goalie, you know. Apparently Bordeaux does a lot of practice where they just, they make the ball bounce around and then just see what happens. So Norman, that's interesting because you would have come up in coaching where people had cones and they had structures and boxes. and then we're going to have five by fives and we're going to replicate goal line, all that stuff. How do you practice chaos?

How do you create it? Before Norman goes, I just want to clear up what I'm saying and I think I didn't answer your app into a little rabbit hole at MW. MW has lots of rabbit holes, don't worry. Yeah, I went to 2.1 there.

I went to 2.1, I got too excited. we were talking about about chaos and what does that look like some people when they see the bulb and flung around and you know things look a little bit more exciting they call it chaos or when people do off-the-cuff stuff they do they call it chaos chaos can also be in a very structured way i mean like we try to create chaos in a structured way so it might look like chaos to you but we know exactly what's happening. It's situational. So instead of like straight up structure where things are set and quite static, we do it, we create structure where things are a little bit chaotic, but we put things in place that would allow us to benefit from that chaos.

And then obviously we didn't turn into personnel. We have pretty amazing athletes within our union, people that play off the cuff, people that can create magic from anywhere so we want to be utilizing those skills right you want to be making sure that whatever they're good at we play towards that so it's all about like playing towards the guys that we have here and for us that's chaos so we do it in a way that's a little bit more structured uh it looks a little bit chaotic to the eye but we know exactly what happened then it's a power position for us i need to answer your question um myself and darby so it's quite a funny story so darby started at powerhouse in 2003 that's when i'm a trick later he was a skills coach and my first team rugby coach was talking common france and the cat so darby was doing the skills for the first team when i was there now we're coaching together Back then he has put out a few cones, but only to do side stepping and passing. Now obviously there's no more cones involved. Not one of us has a whistle. We coach and scream.

So, and that's really because we believe in small games, 8v8, 6v6, 10v10. And obviously if you go 15 on 15, then Seabella might only touch the ball five times in a session. If we go 8v8, Sabella might touch the ball 15 or 20 times in a session or in that specific time that we want. And I also get time, I also get more time like that, spending time with the individual to coach the fence with him. So maybe a forward gets trapped opposite him five times in that running session.

In the game, he might only be once or twice because he's normally only defending forwards, but now at least that twice or once opportunity, I know for a fact, if you can say, if you stop him you can stop anyone in the in the urc so that that that benefits us um from not having cones and coaching in smaller groups um games and the guys actually likes it if you ask france malaraba what got him fit after covet was just that game it's not the bicycle or running up and down was physically the games yeah they said norman also a lot of uh coaching on the defensive side to me sounds like marriage advice um you know you're talking about stay connected uh talking about time and space spend time uh slowing slow down um but i mean it's also the public talks about line speed and isn't the point really no matter what you use whatever words you use shooters blitz is hold fold you're trying to take time and space away from the other guys no isn't it the bottom line is you try to make them make as tough a decision as possible all the time 100 um one thing i'm not dissing anyone now but if you go to europe to the smaller smaller um stadiums i must say the crowds are in it um the moment we have someone shooting over the line flying offside then like haven't you seen lines between the whole stadium says it together normally like the welsh they practice this they oh they sing it offside it kills me i'm like i thought it was a grader and all of a sudden you just see the ar off side i think this better guy had the background now you understand right it's applying pressure onto onto the attacking team um putting their skill set under pressure that's basically if you if you take one two words skill set under pressure that's what when you do on a on attack that's you can use lion speed you can use blitz whatever but that's just basically not so yeah see bella the cardiff doesn't offload as much they kick a lot they're known for their kicking. I think it's maybe the only team in the top part of the URK that kicks more than Stormers. So in a way they're kind of old school and they can frustrate you a bit. Just watching that game, you know, from the outside of watching it, is that what you saw that they sort of were like an awkward opponent to play sometimes? Yeah, they do a couple of things that are a little bit awkward.

but I think from the game that we played they'll be more confident and try to keep the ball because they got us a little bit back footed a lot so they'll back themselves to get around us and they'll be more confident going for the ball because they scored a couple of good tries you know wide in terms of kicking they didn't kick too much against us to be quite honest I the kicking was kind of like pretty much similar um but yeah if if they want to kick we are well put for that and we won't put for the run as well uh they they're not a bad team they have really good carriers they disrupted us a lot at rock time i think that's pretty much where the game was won uh most likely because they disrupted us so much and we couldn't get ascendancy you know have to always fall back so if we can fix those little things i think we could we could be all right um but people don't give them as much credit as they as they should they are really good team norman their fly-off was driving me crazy i took it as a personal insult that he was falling down sweating he looked confused he looked like he was running away from jail but he kept getting he kept getting uh little breaks why was someone not just absolutely rearranging his ribs not going to give away anything it was it was quite frustrating because i prayed for the other fluff because this guy wasn't in the mix so um the guy that i prayed for is a guy that played for wales against africa and obviously got some good info from some springboard guys knowing how to deal with him and this guy rocks up on the team sheet so i had to reverse myself and saying well what does he look he's a good ball carrier um and he do have this like a showing go that can't catch you off guard that's how i got near thing for sure it's near thing still feels bad about the mistakele but uh told him it happens um just be better the next time but stuff like that i mean on the day just got away with it and i really think he had a great game i mean i can't take anything away from him i mean he's it was really good i mean took the right options, played the right options. And when he had to run, he did well as well. I just want to say something that's got nothing to do with rugby, but Harry and I were recording a podcast with Martin Devlin in New Zealand, and Harry was watching your game while I was talking to Martin Devlin, and I saw Harry's face the entire game, going from elation at that first, you know, the try right in the beginning, towards, oh shit, we're going to lose this game. I just want to rub that in a little bit there. Thank you.

I couldn't even ask any questions. i was that was like oh yeah and that's all i had yeah sure yeah and i was so upset man so norman what's your favorite angle to watch uh from a defensive standpoint if you could just you know if you could stand anywhere on the pitch where would you watch the guys i'm quite energetic so i can't exactly tell you which depends which area i want to look at if i want to check the wide angles i stand a bit further back um you ask when i'm when we're training no in the game in a match unfortunately i'm in the box getting water my angle it's square there's no way you stay in the box i've seen no no i've sat in the box i think twice i almost broke the window yeah it gets disqualified he'll get banned from beating inside the box he's gonna yeah the ears are not gonna function after that game yeah obviously defense is a lot about emotion though in the end you have to get fired up it's hard um you know on a long defensive set you know it just feels like it's funny how you know anyone who's ever boxed you don't realize how much three minutes feels like you know your arms heavy tackling the same in rugby you know 90 seconds 150 seconds of tackling and it feels like murder a lot of it comes down to toughness at some point i i watched this incredible video of a basketball coach uh in america coach cheshevsky coach k and he gets his players together early in the season and has them over and he talks about toughness but he he puts it this way sibello it's interesting he goes i want you to be as tough as your mother i want you to be as tough as your grandmother and he picks on players and he wants to know their story because all of them have a mother or a grandmother that got up for work did never stopped you know and that's that's the toughness he's wanting that don't give up um i love that because it's now you're getting to know people talk to me a little bit about that about how much you get to know the guys the stormers i know i've been around you enough to hear that there's a where i'm from section that people talk about where they're from um you know how does that play out in in the game of the game of life affecting the game of rugby? That's exactly what we started this conversation with, you know, when you asked me, um, how do I get to a point that I'm this? It's exactly that. It's, you have to understand where a person comes from and what they've been through to get to the point that they're at now.

And obviously you have to then from that point, understand where they're trying to go to understand their mindset uh we have these little segments where we get to know each other like i said we have a way from where a person gets to tell their story from you know the beginning up to the point that they are at now and obviously shared aspirations as well going forward uh what would the luck achieve and that's not just for the players the coaches tell their stories the backroom staff also tell their stories so it's literally trying to get as many people within the organization to tell their stories because we all have a story right and to show different sides also to where people come from but understanding that you know you can you can connect with a person and some people obviously find relatability but you get to understand the gravitas of the person how they operate or what makes them operate rather in some instances uh and then cling on to that when you see them you're not just seeing this rugby player that is beside you you get like a deeper sense of contribution into these stories like this is what this person is trying to achieve i can sip into that energy and try to make it harder for him so it's not just It not just about that defensive set anymore It about a personal connection that you having with a human being and helping them achieve what they achieve by empowering them you know by doing this model thing which is defense at the point in time, but you're so connected with daydream and where they're trying to go and who they do it for that you kind of get energy from partaking in that little piece of, I guess, journey that they're going through. So it deepens, you know, connections, it interweaves our relationships as human beings and not just from a plain front, but, you know, manageable and also from a start perspective. And it just makes this whole environment almost operate as a family because you get to know people deeply and you get to care and feel and contribute towards their livelihood, let's say, by just playing a simple game called rugby. It's a beautiful thing. I just wanna add to that.

So one thing I like to do, I mean you obviously watch my where I'm from, being in PE. I'm still recovering from that. I promise. You can ask people, that's for sure. With a good excitement.

So one thing I proud myself, it was literally 10 years ago, 2017, one of the coaches that gave me the opportunity to be involved with the senior most problems time whistle problems team at that time tell me um you're a bit too friendly with the guys they're not going to take you so serious i said but my approach is completely different than yours you're a bit older than me if i know what's going on say a bill's life if i know she'll be on his girlfriend might have had problems or if if i don't know it i get you on a monday morning so bello why the did you miss a tackle he's sitting there this guy didn't even know myself my girlfriend had a massive fight yesterday or my grandmother passed away on saturday off the game but if i if i do know that and have a special relationship with with all with all the guys i mean i'll walk in the gym in the morning for like 10 minutes of his time probably at the gym at least taking some time off just to find out how so we can what to do get around and i try to do that with every person but i'm trying to say because we have a good relationship in a meeting if i tell sabella sabella that was not good enough then i didn't know or he didn't respect me then sometimes you can just drift out and say if you and then you'll be a come and go coach and i made that decision earlier on to make sure i need to understand the person who i'm working with doesn't matter where or where he comes from i need to understand him and he need to understand me And it allows us to be a better team because then you can step in for someone. I mean, if someone's not on it on the day, which happens, you know, with a human, you as a person that knows them intensely can step in and be like, okay, cool. Today I'm prepared to do double work because this person is not on the A game. Next week will be fine again. Then he can step in for me maybe.

The aim is to obviously get us to all fire, but it doesn't always happen like that. I would think team environments you need people that can absorb other people's kind of mishaps and i guess like from that point on you know when it all clicks it could be amplified it's such a great point and what a kaleidoscope of backgrounds that you get to learn and it must be such a privilege for you norman to get to know these young men where they are love them as they are where they're from and literally be family um with him going through some really tough things it's funny to me going you know coming up mv and i are from the same uh era you know and and our dads and and all the worms that were coaching us and putting us through our paces it's like they thought if they say i love you their balls would fall off you know they it was that's basically i like you did you guys grow up in the freestyle run through this wall now you know don't ask questions put your head through the wall come go don't i and so you know so you're getting to know the people the man behind this you know the facade and all that but i suppose also you have to manage emotion norman so how much emotion is too much you know have you ever found the point where you almost had too much going on because it's still the job to do as well you know yeah look i coach indian 2009 i had to stay there for two two years but due to certain reasons i lost it here and i came back um and the different cultures in the indian community the different languages very similar to us i mean how many languages we have 11 they also have indy just that but different dialects our captain was a well-educated guy um nasa russain and the first training um i went to chenna and i saw this 30 kid play rugby i said no uh doesn't have um doesn't know his parents he said listen look i can give you a bed and food um looks like a decent rugby player come and play our captain just refused to translate english to him because he couldn't speak a word of english and I thought to myself, how the hell will I break this down? And that's actually where I realized I need to go a bit deeper. I need to understand where these people come from. And that's actually opened up a lot of stuff for me, coaching India, going into my career as a coach.

I understand, I need to understand him. I need to understand this guy. I need to understand that guy. And different cultures, different backgrounds, and you need to get them together to make sure they defend that white line for you. What's the predominant emotion right now, Cibelo, coming into this revenge match against Cardiff, quarterfinal, home, destiny in your hands, you know, take care of business.

What's the underlying emotion? Excitement. And I guess that's been kind of like the conversation that we've been having amongst ourselves is to not lean too much into the revenge complexity of this game. and not add too much emotion in their regard. I mean, some people use it obviously to feel themselves, but we must make sure that we're not overtaken by it.

We must get back to say, hey, we have a quarter-final, we're playing at home in front of our fans. We have potential of making it all the way. How do we at this stage of the season, renew our energy and make sure that we are up for this thing? and excitement and enjoying what's in front of us is gonna do that for us, you know, because no doubt we have the players to go all the way, you know, it's about firing and enjoying ourselves. We basically said that, I said to the group, I think it was on Wednesday, I mean it was Wednesday today, Tuesday, yesterday.

Positive Tuesday. Yeah, positive. Adam Singh. I said to the group, it was like, you'd hardly find the instance where someone has low energy when they're enjoying themselves, like doing whatever. When you enjoy yourself, automatically your energy is filled up.

You reach us all the time. So if you focus on that, then I know we'll have the right energy and connection going to this game. And that's just eternal. I imagine with the external stuff of having the supporters behind us and all of that, you know, playing at home. It's going to add to all of that.

But it's important to note that this is within our control and we must enjoy ourselves so that we can impose what we're trying to do and not go back into trying to get into the revenge too much because that can also cloud us. We don't want to be clouded. We want to be, I spoke about freedom a lot today. We want to be free. We want to be open.

We want to see opportunities. We want to react to opportunities. We don't want to be clouded by emotion and see red all the time because that's going to make us miss a lot. with that type of team i love that answer and subalara when i watch you play it looks like you're having fun in the moment i mean am i wrong are you you actually out there enjoying this stuff i love this man i love this i couldn't imagine myself doing anything you know having this i love sports entirely um and i always try to smile and i always try to enjoy myself because i understand it's not going to be forever i mean i'm 33 now so it's almost feeling like i'm losing a grip of this rugby thing um so i overemphasize the the enjoyment of being in the situation doing what you love you know putting your energy into something that you're passionate about you know persevering is something that you're passionate about you know some most people i talk to a lot of people most people don't they go to their jobs and they have to they're forced to do this thing right that they don't enjoy and they they expect to persevere and they expect to be resilient they expects to give their all they expect to do to walk on i'm doing in a space that i enjoy so what great issue is that you know it's a privilege and i'm as a stem opposition so i always try to enjoy myself and smile when i'm out there because i am really doing something yes it's hard like other things but it's something that i truly enjoy obviously you like it you see this face you love it and you get to meet people like this so it's as well but can you t can you teach andre hugo fans with a smile is is it possible can you can you virtually impossible even the reverse or ask him if he can buy some for you or bring back the preset your smart yeah that's great well listen guys uh it's been really great to have you norman wonderful that you're still doing this job instead of robbing banks uh so try to keep keep employed so that you can stay on the right side of the law uh i'm going to robbing banks say hello it's been wonderful to see your interactions what we love about this series is the side by side literally physically side by side but also the something you don't usually get on sports costs and you know broadcasts is actually the conversation and the vibe between player and coach which is norman as you say it's much closer than it was in the past and you you become friends you're obviously really enjoying each other now now you say that harry but like these are the sort of people that you call first i mean you know if i if i don't feel good about something or if i have something that's bothering me call him or have a conversation with him like moment i don't like something like that this what's going on as well and we talk about things so it's not really a facade and what you are building here harry is it has legs to actually go beyond just the street into other facets because it's the way of connecting you know as men we don't do it a lot like you said in the older days you know saying a lot from the world some sort of a offense but like as men i think we need these sort of sessions to to connect you know deeply about just that um it's important because we don't have this type of things you know a whole lot coming from where we're coming from so you need those type of intentions with me yeah for sure yeah only in retrospect you look back sometimes and teammates i had they really needed to share things and if they had it would have gone differently and life life would have gone differently for them and we were probably their best first last resort but they didn't know how to say it i love that um you know being around you guys and just seeing how people put their hands up as well i messed up there i missed that you know it's you don't have to wait for the coach to shout at you the players are the ones putting their hands up norman i suppose in some ways you think job done when you see that you know now you don't have to be shouting at someone they just take accountability i will still shout at you mistake if you notice it almost like why the fuck did you make the mistake there you go nice uh awesome man love great chat check great chat can i just say this this is a very very um confusing series for me because i'm a bull sports like i said right at the beginning and i find it very hard to think that i actually like you guys you know so we don't have to go damn i don't want to know about some below or whatever he's falling in love one week at a time now he's kicking me drag my hair i'll never cross that line that 50.1 line you know that's it that's the spot and there you have blue and white hooped underpants i know it i know it no no no no no i'm sorry to say yeah we're joking we're joking keep keep on to your side man uh we know it's or love it's it's rugby in my blood it's in my blood there we go also the dream of the season is the final between bulls and stars that's just we have to just keep winning that's it that would be amazing can you imagine can you imagine all right guys awesome good luck to against cardiff um we'll let you know when this goes out appreciate you guys making time for us it was this was a special episode i must be honest thanks guys really great chat thank you Good luck.

Thank you.

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