After several failed attempts to retire from international rugby over the past 12 months, James Slipper knows his playing days are numbered. The number itself is unknown and could remain so for some time. Promotiv turned 37 in June and will definitely play for ACT Brumbies in 2027, extending his Super Rugby record of 212 games, but the fifth Rugby World Cup the outlook is far less certain.
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“I had a lot of chats with ‘Kissy’ (Wallabies coach Les Kiss),” Slipper, whose 154 Australia The caps are a national record, he told the 8/9 Rugby Podcast.
“He was open with all of us – Bernard Foley, Kurtley Beale – being in the same boat. It’s a really good opportunity for the young players to run away with it this year and really build their journey, get some miles in the legs in the jersey.
“And that’s important because you can’t rely on the older players to just keep playing because it just doesn’t work that way. You have to expose these boys to top level rugby.”
So it really came as no surprise when Slipper was not named in the 33 players named by Kiss last week for November’s conclusion of the Nations Championship.
After playing the first three matches in July while the Wallabies had something of a prop shortage, Slipper spent his time away from maintaining proper winter fitness levels and looking after his two young daughters who “just want to pull my hair out”.
But the recent Super Rugby AUS series also gave Slipper his first taste of life after playing – whenever that might be. With forwards coach John Ulugia away with the Wallabies, the Brumbies took the opportunity presented by the short Australian home series to step in Slipper as specialist scrum coach. With many thousands of scrums packed into a career spanning over 350 first-class games, wisdom oozes from Slipper.
Sorry, well… an old guy from a short tournament that was really designed to get the young players extra game time, and gave Slipper a valuable first taste of what will very likely become his role when he finally and decisively retires.
“I was like a hybrid coach because technically I was still coaching,” he said. “So I would coach the set, help Benny (Mowen, Brumbies senior assistant coach) with the set-up and the maul and then obviously coach the scrum.
I know everything I want to train. The biggest thing for me was how do I make everyone else understand what I mean?
“But then my boots were on the whole time and I was half in, half out. But I really enjoyed it.
“I’ve learned a lot. And I kind of know everything I want to coach. The biggest thing for me was how do I make everyone else understand what I’m thinking? And it’s always a challenge for a coach to say it in an understandable way. I wouldn’t say I’m the best speaker, but I feel like I can speak at a level that guys can understand well, and that’s probably one of my strengths.
“I really enjoyed it. It was good just working with Benny and Hoops (Brumbies skills coach Dan Hooper) and Bernie (Stephen Larkham). I really learned a lot.”
But like all the best-laid plans, it almost unraveled before the first game of the series, when Slipper once again found himself a ‘break the glass in case of emergency’ playing option.
“We played a test match and Tevita (Alatini), our young stalwart, got a concussion. So for the first two rounds I was technically cover – if someone went down in the warm-up, I’d have to play.
“That’s why I warmed them up really quickly for the first two games, just to avoid injuries! Fortunately, they were all ready to play, but yes, I would have played if I had to.”
And so, despite this little setback, Slipper’s coaching experience has gone pretty well. But he quickly noticed one big difference compared to playing life.
“I’m telling you, game days were so different as a coach!” he laughed.
“As a player, it’s the biggest day of the week. You kind of reconstruct everything backwards from game day, so you prepare and know all that stuff, whereas in coaching it’s the opposite.
“Come game day, you’re done. You have no influence. Obviously you can prepare the guys, warm them up, talk to them if you need to, but as far as training goes, you shouldn’t still be training on game day. I was stress free, it was great!
“The biggest days were Monday and Tuesday, working behind the scenes and facilitating training, that’s kind of my new game day as a coach.”
They don’t just slap together and say, ‘okay, let’s get better’. There’s all the planning and thinking about how we’re going to achieve it, how long we train. Also, how hard are we going?
And apparently, waking up on Sunday morning isn’t nearly as painful?
“Yeah. I actually woke up and trained most Sundays. I felt so fresh!”
Importantly, the short-term gig did not scare Slipper away from the thought of coaching. And it also gave him an added appreciation for how far the Brumbies staff have come.
“The amount of detail and knowledge and planning that goes into these sessions, that was probably the biggest thing I took away,” he said.
“They’re not just putting sessions together and saying, ‘okay, let’s get better’. There’s all the planning and thinking about how we’re going to do it, how long we’re training. Also, how hard are we going? What intensity? Those things were really insightful.”
Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed Slipper’s former Brumbies and Wallabies teammate, Nic White, who was involved in Kiss’ coaching schedule during the Bledisloe Cup. I am now learning on the job with Western Force As a skills coach himself, White is in a similar position to Slipper, trying to share what he knows with a younger playing group.
Slipper believes that recently retired players can be of great help to programs with which they are still very familiar.
“Yes, I think it’s important. We want the coaching path to be nice and strong. There are a lot of former players who either went abroad or played for a long time and learned as much in the game as players who can easily transfer to new players.
“And yes, I always think you have to do the hard work. You can’t just come in and take over the Wallabies as a recent ex-player.”
“But I believe the more we recycle players into those coaching positions, the better we’ll be as a game in general.”
Although he has been the first to admit that ‘student’ plates were very important during his first steps on the coaching journey, Slipper is excited about the next evolution of his record-breaking life in professional rugby. These early days as a hybrid player/coach only cemented his ambitions.
“Yeah, I’m still leaning towards (the coach),” he said. “Like, now I’ve tried a little and I’m in a phase where I’m trying to learn as much as I can. Not only from coaching, but just from life in general, from different industries.”
“I really love the game. Obviously I’ve played it long enough to tell everybody that I enjoy the game. So at some point I want to, for lack of a better term, get back into the game. I want to stay involved in the game. Whether that’s coaching at the highest level, the lowest level, I don’t know yet.
“It’s probably something I’ll look at more over the next year as the career starts to wind down. But yeah, I’ve really enjoyed it at this stage and we’ll see what happens.”
