Rugby league is a tribal game.
Everyone has their allegiances, their teams, their communities.
Andrew Auimatagi is no exception.
At the grassroots, he’s a Linwood Keas man — player-coach of their premier men’s side.
Now 30, he joined the club when he was 9.
His father played the game, and his mother came from a big rugby league family, so it was always going to be his code of choice.
He grew up playing in the forwards, as a second rower or hooker, before moving into the halves as he grew older.
In 2007, he ruptured his achilles tendon, which forced him to spend an entire season on the sideline.
He spent that time coaching the Linwood reserves — his first real taste of that role — and they had a rather successful year.
Auimatagi went back to playing after that, then in 2012 he was approached to become player-coach of the premier side.
He runs trainings on Tuesday and Thursday nights.
This particular Thursday, it’s the day after the second game in this year’s State of Origin series.
Most of the Keas are New South Wales supporters, and with their side having won the game, and thus the series, for the first time since 2005, they’re in a jubilant mood.
Auimatagi is a Queensland supporter, and so his players and support staff sense he’s ripe for some good-humoured banter.
It’s those tribal allegiances coming to the fore again.
After the banter about State of Origin subsides, Auimatagi takes the team through the plan for that weekend’s game, a must-win encounter with the Riccarton Knights.
He says the team always attempts to have a bit of discussion at the start of trainings.
“We try to sit down and reflect on our games — have a chat about what went well, and what we’re going to focus on in training.”
Then it’s outside, onto Linwood Park, where the field is in a pretty sorry state.
It’s freezing cold and muddy, but the players show no reluctance as they run through drills, practising the moves they will rely on on Saturday.
Auimatagi breaks the aims of rugby league down like this.
His side are looking to get in good field position, then they have set structures, or moves, they want to carry out.
But, in the heat of the battle, that’s easier said than done, and sometimes it just comes down to gut instinct.
“There’s an element of structure, but then also reading what’s in front of you and taking opportunities as they come,” he says.
Linwood isn’t Auimatagi’s only tribe.
He’s a health and physical education teacher at St Thomas of Canterbury College, and also coaches their league sides.
His interest in the profession began when he got talking to a student teacher while at the college himself.
He put himself through teacher’s college, knowing it could be something to work on should his attempt at a professional league career not work out.
Auimatagi trialled with the Parramatta Eels, his favourite NRL side, in 2004.
Although he didn’t crack the squad, he says it was a great, challenging experience.
“Just seeing that professional setup kind of opened my eyes a bit about what I could bring back to Linwood,”
For Auimatagi, coaching means that kind of constant evolution.
“I’m still developing as a coach, picking up new things all the time,” he says.
“I’ve learnt off some really experienced coaches at club and rep level, and just taken different bits from each of their styles and tried to incorporate them in some way.”
Linwood have had a mixed bag of a season.
They get the win they need against Riccarton, by just one point, leaving both teams tied with the Hornby Panthers on 10 points.
Only two of those sides will join league-leaders Celebration Lions and Halswell Hornets in the playoffs, and there are only three games remaining in the regular season.
“We’ve identified areas we need to keep working on, it just comes down to how we prepare and how we deliver on game day.”
Their final game is set to be against Hornby on July 12, in what could end up being a winner-takes-all affair.
Down at Linwood Park that afternoon, with a return to finals football on the line, Auimatagi’s tribe will surely be out in full force.
Auimatagi says his work with secondary school students has been extremely rewarding.
Before he moved to St Thomas of Canterbury College, he was at Aranui High School, where he was director of the school’s rugby league academy.
He was a St Thomas boy himself growing up, and leapt at the chance to get league up and running there.
Trainings with the school teams are a different beast to those with Linwood.
“Especially for the rugby guys, it’s more focusing on the league-specific skills, and them understanding the difference between the two skills,” he says.
They also work on off-field issues.
“What it means to be a good person, having a good work ethic — really hammering that home.”
“It’s great for my teaching and the relationships outside of the classroom” says Auimatagi.
“If we can strengthen those through coaching and interactions with sport, it just helps with the learning that goes on in the classroom. They see that you’re working for them and putting the time into them.”
A few of the boys he coached at Aranui have come through the ranks to the Canterbury Rugby League competition, some joining their former coach at Linwood, others joining up with one of the city’s other clubs.
Auimatagi says it’s “kind of cool” to see players around the tracks that he knows he has had an impact on.
‘I get a real buzz out of seeing them, and their drive, and then coming up against them on the field,” he says.
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