There’s no place like Melbourne – that’s according to our new Attack Coach, Ryan Martin, who returns to the Rebels for the second time in 18 months.
Martin spent the past year plying his trade as Head Coach for the New England Free Jacks in America’s MLR – an experience which made a lasting impact on his coaching philosophy, revealing several new insights which he plans to transfer over to his new role at the Rebels.
Reflecting on his first week back at The Stockade, Martin praised the squad’s mindset and overall determination for attacking the first block of pre-season training.
“The boys are super energetic, I’m really impressed with the attitudes and the intent,” said Martin
“I know the coaches have been really smashing the behaviours, so it’s something I’ve noticed straight away.
“Their body language has been huge; guys are showing heaps of intent in the drills and there seems to be a real buzz of excitement at the moment.”
Universally renowned for his unique coaching methods, Martin believes an early focus on fundamental skills will be crucial to the Rebels pursuit of Super Rugby Pacific glory.
“There’s no hiding from skill set, everyone wants to play an attractive style of football but if you don’t have the skills to do it there’s no point,” said Martin.
“I’ve made no apologies to the players that we’re going to be super detailed and smash the basics to the point where hopefully they get sick of me going on about skills, because that’ll mean we’re going in the right direction of how we want to play the game.”
Following a stirring ending to a promising Trans-Tasman campaign, Martin said the Rebels will enter 2022 full of confidence, driven to make their community proud.
“If you look at the Crusaders game where we had a lot of young fellas in the team, there’s a real excitement there. To keep it to 20 something points against a Crusaders team that was desperately going for points differential to make the finals isn’t easy,” said Martin
“We’ve got to acknowledge that we lost by a big margin, but we need to take those big things and the excitement from the youth and make sure we put some awesome structures around it.”
Register your interest in Rebels membership for 2022
With pre-season underway, all eyes are quickly turning to the upcoming Super Rugby Pacific season, now just four months away.
With the full draw soon to be released, we want you to be the first to know the full range of membership packages when they become available.
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