Graham Lowe became New Zealand coach in 1983 and instantly transformed their fortunes.
The Kiwis tore up the formbook by beating Australia at Lang Park that same year. They beat Great Britain in all three Tests a year later.
In 1985, they took part in two titanic series against Australia and Great Britain.
Lowe went on to coach Wigan between 1986 and 1989. He landed their first league title in 27 years, the World Club Challenge and two Challenge Cups. He later coached Manly, Queensland, Western Samoa and North Queensland Cowboys. He was knighted in 2019 for services to youth and education.
If you could relive one day from your career, which would it be?
There are too many for me to choose one. There were Test matches, Wembleys and Origins. With Wigan, we seemed to have big matches every few weeks. I never forgot where I came from or what it meant to me. I read Rugby League books as a kid in the 1950s and early 1960s. I remember one with colour photos of Wigan playing at Wembley. Coaching there was a dream I thought would never come true.
How did your coaching journey begin?
I played for my local club, Otahuhu Leopards. I had injuries and when I started a business, I knew I couldn’t keep playing. It wasn’t on the radar to start coaching, but they approached me to coach a junior team. I restructured how they trained and convinced them to do more. We had great success in those three years. I then coached premier grade [open age], and we won everything.
Two weeks after Cronulla played Manly in the 1978 Grand Final, they came over to play us, and we beat them. I got an offer from Norths in Brisbane. The Queensland competition was very strong then, so I accepted. They had just come last, their Leagues Club was broke, but we won the Premiership in my second year. Then I got asked to coach the Kiwis.
You transformed the Kiwis, and your win at Lang Park in 1983 is an all-time great New Zealand victory. How did altering the clock in the changing room help you win that match?
Physically and skill wise, I knew we were in with a big chance. But emotionally and mentally, Australia was a big hurdle to clear as far as we were concerned, and Great Britain were in the same boat, so I tried to address some of that. I put the clock back ten minutes and said to the team, “These guys think they’re so special, they’ll try to get us out before we’re ready.” Sure enough, there was a loud knock on the changing room door for us to come out, which the players would have thought was ten minutes early. It stirred everyone up. Instead of everyone going out as a team, I sent the players out one at a time, knowing the crowd would boo. Booing 15 players one at a time was a lot of effort, so they stopped and that was a little victory to us.
Kurt and Dane Sorensen were back in the side. Mark Graham had hurt his knee playing for North Sydney, but we had Graeme West and Gary Prohm, who was really underrated as a loose forward. We had Howie Tamati at hooker and Mark Broadhurst at prop. We were given no chance, but we came up with plans to draw in the defence, and each time we did it, we scored.
Were you surprised how uncompetitive the Lions were in 1984?
I’d been over to Australia to watch them and couldn’t believe they picked Ellery Hanley on the wing. I’d seen him play in England and knew he was too good for that. He just wasn’t getting enough ball in that Great Britain team. They did move him to centre in the third Test, and he just about beat us. Little did I know that I’d coach him one day at Wigan.
You coached Oceania against Europe in France in 1984.
That was a very different experience. We had Papua New Guinean players, along with Kiwis and Australians. We prepared as hard as we could, but the promotion of the game was probably the worst I have ever seen. The Europe side hadn’t prepared at all. It looked like they’d just met one another. It was a very strange game with a rock-hard pitch. They had Rocky-type music when the players came out, but there was no crowd, and we won 54-4.
The Kiwis were involved in two of the greatest Test series of all time in 1985. You lost two Tests to Australia on the hooter and drew a series with Great Britain. Nearly 37 years on, how do you look back at these six Tests?
They were very tough matches and a last glimpse of how Test football used to look. I look back on them all with pride, because when Australia beat us in Auckland in the second Test, they knew they had been very lucky. They were good enough to win, but we deserved to win. That’s just the way it goes. And then we beat them 18-0.
In England, Mark Graham broke his ankle and cheekbone in the first Test and he was crucial to us. It was just a matter of hours before the third Test that we got him fit, but it was disruptive. It was an aggressive game at Elland Road. Lee Crooks kicked that great goal from the sideline to earn a series draw. He probably couldn’t have kicked another of those from 100 attempts!
You referred to Graham as the best player in the world. What made him such a special player?
At that stage, I hadn’t coached Ellery or Wally Lewis. Now I have, I can’t separate the three of them. They are the three best players the game has seen. They were all so tough, they had ability on their own to win a match, they were unselfish and determined to help every player give their best because they were such great leaders.
Olsen Filipaina, who was playing for the Eastern Suburbs reserves, famously got the better of Lewis in 1985. Had you identified any weaknesses in Lewis?
I don’t think Wally had any weaknesses. You just have to limit their opportunities. Olsen had been playing with Balmain and Easts, but he had been brainwashed into being a robotic-type player. All I did was take that away and let him play his natural game. I knew how he wanted to play and I knew it would surprise Wally, because Wally hadn’t seen that type of player. Olsen was so powerful in the hips and so quick over 10 or 15 metres. We aimed to minimise Wally’s chances with the ball and then throw everything at him when we had the ball. Olsen was the ideal player for that.
Rugby League only saw the best of Olsen a few times because he was so constrained. Great Britain has also fallen in love with this robotic style from Australia. It takes the flair away from the players. It is over-coaching and Olsen is a great example of it.
That first Trans-Tasman Test also saw the infamous Tamati-Dowling fight. Is it a shame that the fight overshadowed a great series?
Yes, you don’t want that sort of thing to happen, but it’s not a game of marbles either. A Test match is a test of everything. In earlier days, Test matches were even more rugged, but television brought the game into people’s living rooms, and the behaviour of players had to change.
Under your coaching, the Kiwis were far more entertaining and skilful than the All Blacks. How frustrating was it to know you could never match them for popularity?
I’m 75 now, and I’ve been involved in Rugby League since I was five. Rugby union gets such a huge advantage that you would never believe. It’s changed a lot because of the players who bond together, no matter which code they are playing, so old attitudes towards Rugby League have improved, but we were always treated badly even when we were the best team in the country.
Tell us about the Rainbow Warrior incident, which overshadowed the French leg of your tour in 1985.
The French bombed a Greenpeace ship called the Rainbow Warrior in the Port of Auckland in July 1985, just before we left. It was on its way to protest against a planned nuclear test by the French. New Zealand is isolated and free and we don’t expect terrorist incidents. We only read about them in Europe or America, so everyone was horrified. The feeling towards the French wasn’t too good, but we had to treat that leg of the tour with respect. The media hounded us for opinions about it and we just kept saying, “No comment!” We won all the games there, but the standard of refereeing was pretty ordinary. With 20 minutes left in the last match, I sent a message to the players, saying, “Remember the Rainbow Warrior,” and it gave them the chance to get rid of some frustrations!
Wigan beat the Kiwis in 1985, but you had obviously impressed Maurice Lindsay, who made you their coach a year later.
I knew it would be the toughest game we would face outside the Tests, and much of the blame can be laid squarely on me. We had some young guys on tour, and I needed to see what they could do in England against hardened professionals. We played a couple of players at Wigan that probably wasn’t fair on them. I knew Ellery would find them out straightaway. Ellery beat us that day, not Wigan.
Dean Bell was one of your first Wigan signings. You’d initially used him on the wing for the Kiwis.
I knew him really well because I’d seen him play so much in Auckland. He was a centre all day long with a big career in front of him at centre. Dean was so tough and he wouldn’t shy away from anything, but I played him on the wing in those early days for New Zealand to edge him in, and he scored a great try at Lang Park against Australia.
You signed Wally Lewis in 1986 but he didn’t fulfil the contract, with Lindsay accusing him of double-crossing Wigan. What happened?
We signed him, and he was keen to come, but he had a chronic shoulder injury, and he didn’t pass a medical in Australia to let him go, which I found out in later years. There was no more to it than that.
You went on to win nearly everything with Wigan, but does the name Paddy Kirwan still give you nightmares?
Oldham? Well, I still remember that night! I didn’t understand the importance of the Challenge Cup. Maurice said to me they hadn’t won the Championship in 27 years. Coming from this part of the world, that was the ultimate goal. There are no knock-out competitions here, so I didn’t put the emphasis on it I should have done. I was so angry because we didn’t play well, and I soon saw the despair and the effect the defeat had on people. I knew then we had to win it.
Why did you move Hanley to loose forward and how did he take it?
From the very first time I saw him play, I thought he’d be a loose forward if I coached him. He wasn’t at his peak then because he wasn’t getting the opportunities. No player has ever achieved what Ellery did, in moving from the backs to the forwards without it reducing the impact he had on games. His work rate increased tenfold. He was doing 30-odd tackles every week which he didn’t do in the backs, and he was still a matchwinner. To make that move, do the workload and still have a huge impact on the game is incredible, and I don’t think we’ll ever see it again. He just accepted it when I told him I wanted to do it. He practised how to be a loose forward more than anyone would understand. For those of us close to what he was doing, it was no surprise that he continued to dominate games and score tries.
When Wigan won the League Championship in 1987, what did you think of Lindsay’s idea to invite Manly over for a World Club Challenge?
I thought it was a great idea. My then wife Karen and I were having a drink with Maurice at the Bull’s Head, and we were excited about winning the Championship. He asked how we would go against the top Australian sides and I said we’d beat any of them. The Great Britain mentality was to think everything with an Australian accent was automatically great, but I believed in the British game, probably more than many in the Great Britain set-up. Maurice had Ken Arthurson’s number, and we called him on the spot. Maurice had the deal done in ten minutes. It was unbelievable. It was one of the game’s greatest examples of two statesmen coming up with a great idea and putting it into place with minimum fuss. The administrators of today are too self-centred to pull something like that off. They are too focused on their own little patch, but Maurice and Ken both had a global vision.
The game was like a State of Origin. I was so proud of not just the players but the Wigan town. The British game had been hammered from pillar to post because Great Britain couldn’t win anything, so it put a spring in everyone’s step. Wigan’s team was all British that night as well and I was really proud of that.
Relations between Hanley and the club broke down between January and March 1988 with the player staying away and finding himself transfer listed. What happened?
I take full responsibility. It was between Ellery and me, not the club. I prided myself on understanding players and getting in their heads, but I totally misread Ellery, and I will always apologise until the day I die. I put him and the club through a tough time that shouldn’t have happened. But we had a chat, patched it up and never spoke about it again. A coach always learns, and that was one of the greatest learning curves of my career. I should have handled it far better.
Wigan reached Wembley in 1988, winning the Challenge Cup for the first time since 1965. What are your memories of that day?
I couldn’t believe 80 minutes could go that quickly. I was totally confident in our preparation and knew we would win. Andy Gregory was a master at the peak of his powers. Has the game ever seen a better combination than Andy, Ellery and Shaun Edwards in those positions? They all got the opportunity to do what they needed to do.
You also had disputes with Andy and Shaun.
The three of them will tell you I wouldn’t compromise. That carries an incredible risk. The philosophy of the average player in the UK was different to what I was used to, but those three were world class and wanted to win as much as I did. I had my disagreements, but I loved them dearly like they were my own family because I knew what they had done for me
You beat Saints 27-0 in the 1989 Challenge Cup Final, gaining revenge for their Wembley wins over Wigan in the 1960s.
I was absolutely confident again, although I didn’t know what the score would be. I’d seen them prepare and there was so much honesty in the team. My mantra was the same after every win: “We won it with class, and we won it with style.”
Do you have any other memories of Wigan?
One of Maurice’s masterstrokes was bringing Jeff Hurst in to help me. He was a headteacher of a St Helens primary school. I needed help understanding the players’ accents for one thing! He’d been involved with amateur football, and he became my right-hand man. He was important during the disputes with Ellery, Andy and Shaun. I could bounce things off him and I couldn’t have done it without him.
Why did you leave Wigan?
I went for three years, but Maurice offered me the job for life towards the end of my third year, which excited me. Even if I stopped coaching, he said they’d give me another job. I left in 1989 because I got a call from my ex-wife who asked me to go back and help one of my daughters, who needed help with issues at school. It all happened very quickly. As soon as it became public, I got so many offers. I went to Manly because I was close to Ken. He was very similar to Maurice. “Forget about these other offers, you’re coming here,” he said. I’d still be at Wigan today otherwise. I loved Wigan more than anywhere else I’ve coached. I had a 20-30 year plan in my mind. We’d built a new house there. There wasn’t a possibility of me leaving, but one of my children needed me, and that was it.
You coached Manly for two years.
It was great there but very different to Wigan. It is a fantastic club with a great environment in a great part of the world. They hadn’t re-signed eight current internationals because they’d come tenth, so that caused disruption and ill-feeling. I had to manage my way through that and I introduced a lot of young players who went on to play for Australia. We made the semi-finals twice. We were rebuilding the team, but my health started to have a massive impact. I had a number of heart attacks, a stroke and a brain haemorrhage. I should have stopped in 1990 and had some time off, but I kept going and had to stop in 1992. I knew my health was having an impact on what I was doing. These weren’t minor health issues. Karen was told by surgeons I couldn’t possibly survive it at various times, so I knew I had to stop.
You coached Queensland to success in 1991 in Lewis’s last year. Had he become bigger than Origin itself?
He was Origin. He has his statue at Suncorp and it’s not there for no reason. No player has had an influence on Origin football like him and it was a thrill to coach him and for him buy into my way. Mal struggled to kick goals in that series, so the games were all close. Michael O’Connor kicked an amazing goal from the sideline in the teeming rain to win the second match for the Blues. He was my Manly captain at the time. I just stood there and thought, “You bastard!”
How did you enjoy coaching Western Samoa in the 1995 World Cup?
I loved it. Even though we were unlucky against Wales, I was quietly pleased for them because it was in Wales, and it meant so much to them. But we went well with limited preparation and some knocks.
How did you end up at the North Queensland Cowboys in 1996?
I’d been retired from the club game for a couple of years, but they had sacked their coach and had a deal with Tim Sheens for 1997. They needed someone for 1996. It ended up being a very enjoyable year. Having come last in 1995, we moved up three places on a minimal budget, so we did alright.
Your last professional involvement was at Bradford Bulls. What happened?
Andrew Chalmers, a friend of mine, said they were going to go out of existence. We love the game and didn’t want that to happen to such a famous club. We thought we’d do what we could to keep it going. Andrew did all the negotiating, and I came up, but the whole thing was a shambles. We started to work our way through it, but I had another heart attack. I was too far away from the people who had been looking after my health and I wanted to go back. I sold my half and had to get myself right again.
How many heart attacks have you had?
I don’t know. Quite a few – I’ve got stents, I’ve had open-heart surgery twice, I’ve had a number of strokes. The brain haemorrhage sent a lot of that stuff off. I haven’t had a heart attack for a couple of years, but I don’t wait for them. I’m busier than ever before and have no intention of retiring. If the right opportunity came up now, I’d take up coaching again in a heartbeat. People say the game has changed, but I have kept as close to it as possible. The more it’s changed, the more it’s the same. The way the game is played now provides more opportunity to excite the fans because I’m all about attack. The defensive side is the easy side of it. The skilful side needs characters, and the game is guilty of allowing itself to be over-coached. People say I don’t understand because coaching is a science. They are wrong. Coaching is an art. Science backs it up, but coaching is an art. Some coaches can get players to perform but others can’t. You see it in Super League and in the NRL. They have the role, but they don’t have the art of coaching.
The funny thing is, even at 75, I honestly believe I could do it all again tomorrow. I’m busier than ever now. I designed a learning system for disadvantaged kids and received a knighthood for it. I’m now Sir Graham Lowe. The fire has never gone out, and I could get straight back into it tomorrow.
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