Brown observing Silver Ferns to monitor their environment, preparation

Tony Brown has signed for two seasons with the Highlanders. Photo: ODT files
Tony Brown
New Highlanders head coach Tony Brown is watching a round ball this week.

Brown, named head coach for the next two seasons last week, is spending this week in the Silver Ferns camp in Hamilton.

Brown is not learning how to be a netball coach but wants to tap into more of the off-field work and learn how the Silver Ferns turned things around to win the World Cup last year.

Brown could not be contacted yesterday.

It is not the first time a Highlanders coach has gone to watch a team from another code go about its work.

Former coach Jamie Joseph spent a week with Australian rugby league coach Wayne Bennett after the disappointing 2013 season and learned plenty from the experience.

Brown is tapping the minds of head coach Noeline Taurua and assistant Debbie Fuller.

The former All Black first five-eighth told Stuff he wanted to see how the Silver Ferns environment operated and how the team prepared for matches.

The environment had improved over the past two years and Brown wanted to see how that progress had come about and what he could take back to the Highlanders.

Netball coaches have often been involved with rugby sides, but it is not common for rugby coaches to head into netball territory.

Brown was courtside on Wednesday night as the Silver Ferns beat England 58-45.

The two teams play in Hamilton again tonight and finish the series on Sunday.

The Highlanders coach is recognised as one of the best attacking coaches in the world but had preferred to work in an assistant role and shunned the head coaching role.

But after coaching the Highlanders in 2017 and then the Sunwolves in 2019, he felt more experienced in the head coaching role.

 

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