Tamaki Sports Academy

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The move to Australia

We were recently at a youth training session run by a Sydney NRL club. In a question and answer session after the sweating was done a mother asked 'How are you going to look after my son when he moves to Sydney to play for you?' The chap from Sydney answered by referring to their house for out of town boys and the support systems the club had in place.

A better answer would have been "We will provide an environment which gives your boy the best chance of progressing to the NRL, if he has been well prepared for the move to Australia before he gets on the plane. Here’s what we do….. Here’s what we need from you, mum….’

The biggest determinant of relocation success is the quality of the preparation – which should come as no surprise. Protecting an athlete from the risks of living in Tokoroa, for example, does nothing, or worse, to prepare him for the risks of relocating to Sydney. Protection is not Preparation At some stage your boy has to make his own tackles. He'll miss a few, of course he will.

There are the simple things that prepare a boy to leave home - a driver licence, a bank account, teaching him to do his own washing, teaching him to clean up after himself and to put things where he can find them, and teaching him how to cook a few family meals (rather than just noodles for himself or knowing where the nearest bakery and takeaways are).

Then there are the bigger issues. How does he deal with the availability of cocaine in the shared club accommodation? How does he deal with the boys he doesn't like in the shared house? What about church? Nightclubs? Life after midnight? Social media? The pressure of not making it early? If he hasn't had a serious girlfriend and been dumped by her in NZ, how does he deal with this when it happens in Sydney? What happens when he gets homesick? How do we reduce the degreee of homesickness? These are not things an NRL club is able to prepare athletes for.

Relocation is not fun. It is exciting, and challenging, but it is difficult. Most boys don't get to play NRL. Some of those stay in Australia and many of those who do come home are too ashamed to return to rugby league here.

Our approach to relocation is three-fold

• We attempt to delay relocation, or avoid it altogether by encouraging athletes to stay in NZ until they have a real opportunity and have the physical qualities and skills to make a real go of it
• The lifeskills and wellbeing aspects of an individual Development Plan transition athletes to life as an adult
• We work on the Australian end to ensure that things are in place over there before the athlete arrives