The life and times of legendary Australian, Balmain and New South Wales forward Wayne Pearce.

The life and times of legendary Australian, Balmain and New South Wales forward Wayne Pearce.

Wayne Pearce shares his views on the game that he played, loved and how he feels its changed.

Former Balmain Tigers, New South Wales and Australian great Wayne Pearce started his sporting career playing Cricket and Rugby League as a child, and picked up Basketball while he was at high school. Wayne started playing Rugby League in 1970 (the year after the Balmain Tigers won the NSWRL competition in 1969) when he was ten years old as a five eight. When Wayne was in the Under 12’s he shifted from five-eight to lock because there was a good up and coming five eight coming to the club.

Wayne was a born in and breed in Balmain and started playing League for the Balmain Police boys, then moved up the grades and into the junior representative system where he played for Balmain’s SG Ball and Jersey Flegg sides. In 1979, at age nineteen he played a couple of matches in the Balmain under 23 side off the bench and in the same year moved up into the reserve grade (again playing a match off the bench). In the off season of 1979, Balmain’s first choice lock, Neil Pringle had a bad illness so Wayne was put into the first grade training squad and from there performed well in the trials and got put into the first grade side in 1980 without played a true game of first grade. He found that even though it was a big step up from juniors to seniors in one year he found that his teammates and coach Dennis Tubb were very supportive of him which helped. He played every game in 1980 and was lucky enough to be picked for the New South Wales City side in 1980 and found it an awesome experience but a shock to the system.

In 1982, Wayne was selected to tour Great Britain and France on an eleven week 22 game tour where they would play the best club sides in England plus three tests and Great Britain and two test against France. On that tour the Australian side won all twenty-two games they played and received the title of ‘The Invincibles’.  Wayne was selected as just a backup forward but was selected to play in the test matches, in an experienced and star-studded side that had:

• Props – Max Krilich, Les Boyd
• Hooker – Craig Young
• Second Row – Wayne Pearce, Rod Reddy
• Lock – Ray Price
• Halfback – Peter Sterling
• Five-eight – Brent Kenny
• Centers – Mal Menninga, Gene Myles
• Wings – Eric Grothe Sr, Kerry Boustead
• Fullback – Greg Brent

Wayne felt it was an amazing career highlight and also an amazing adventure. Wayne found that touring with a group of guys for a long time made friendships that have lasted till this day. “I roomed with Peter Sterling for the whole time and we are still great mates and you develop bonds with all the players that you are away with for that length of time. You develop fantastic friendships with them and I’m still good mates with all the guys from the tour.” Wayne was also voted by his teammates as the best player on the tour.

After the tour of 1982, Wayne was picked for New South Wales, Game I, 1983 at Lang Park in Brisbane. Back when Wayne played, New South Wales would go down Caxton Street which was busy open street full of bars, the New South Wales bus which go down there slowly with a motorbike police escort at the front. “As soon as the fans saw the motorbike escort they knew it was the New South Wales side. So they would come running out and start rocking the bus which was moving quite slowly. Someone was throwing their plastic cups of beer at the bus and it was them trying to intimidate the players one of the main streets to Lang Park.” Wayne debuted with legendary Australian players like Peter Sterling, Brent Kenny, Ray Price and Mick Cronin but they lost that match 24-12.

One of Wayne’s career highlights was in 1986 where he was privileged to captain the side that bet Queensland 3-0. The side included Origin and Australian greats Steve Roach, Gary Jack, Noel Cleal, (Rugby convert) Michael O’Connor and Royce Simmons and he felt that it an incredible bunch of players with great spirit and a tight knitted side coached by the great Ron Willey.

One origin game Wayne remembers well was 1988, game two at Lang Park. He captained the side when a fight between Phil Daley and Greg Conescu, lead into a classic all in brawl with Queensland and Australian great Wally Lewis was sent from the field. The Queensland fans didn’t like that one little bit and the game was stopped because the Queensland fans chucked all their beer cans on to the field. Wayne explains why Lang Park got its nickname the ‘Colosseum’ “If you wore a blue jumper you were on the outer there and you would be in for a hell of a night because they really didn’t like that. For the actual vibe at the ground was incredibly tense. It was a unique atmosphere but a wonderful atmosphere to experience because the energy of the crowd really elicits that little bit extra when you dig deep.”

From 1985 onwards Balmain never missed a finals series and they made two grand finals in 1988 and 1989. Wayne felt that it was a great feeling to make the grand finals. In 1988 they took the they had a very physical, mentally draining finals series because back then the playoff series was the only for the top five (not eight like it is today) it was also done by wins (not point difference like it is today) so as Penrith finished in fifth and Balmain in sixth they had a playoff to see who made the finals. Balmain won a tough and physical match 28-8. They won there following playoffs matches against the Manly Warrringah Sea-Eagles, Canberra Raiders and Cronulla Sutherland Sharks to make the final against the Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs. Unfortunately for Balmain they strike weapon English great Ellery Hanley went down injured and fatigue set in with them going onto lose 24-12.

In 1989, Balmain were the first side into the grand final (in those days if you were beat the minor premiers in the semifinal you automatically qualified for the final and got a week off) against the Canberra Raiders in the epic grand final that had two extra time periods of ten minutes. Wayne felt that it was one of the most tiring and torrid encounters he ever played in. The grand final boasted roughly twenty players who had international or origin experience including:

Canberra: Steve Walters, Glenn Lazarus, Dean Lands, Gary Belcher, Mal Menninga, Ricky Stuart, Gary Coyne

Balmain: Steve Roach, Paul Sironen, Benny Elias, Bryce Macguire, Gary Jack, Gary Freeman, Andy Currier

Balmain where in front and in control at 12-2 with just under a quarter of the game to go and then “It was a turning point in that match when (the inspirational) Steve Roach and (the skillful) Paul Sironen, two of our international forwards were taken off by Warren Ryan (with under twenty to go he replaced them with Kevin Hardwick and Michael Pobjie) and in those days there were no interchanges (once your off your off). I think that Warren though that we had the game sewn up but Canberra had other views and as I said they scored to level the scores at full time and they beat us”. It was a painful experience for the team to lose the final in those circumstances after being in such a commanding position.

Wayne felt that the best coach he played under was Frank Stanton as he was the coach that gave Wayne his first opportunity in representative football and coached him for five years at Balmain. “He was a great people manager, a good tactician and he would be the coach that I would sort of say made the greatest impression on me.” He also felt that the best tactical coach he played under was Warren Ryan and also felt that the best tactician was Bill Anderson.

Since when Wayne played he feels that the art of being a coach has changed. In his day, the coach did the majority of the work ranging from running the side through to setting up game plans. Today the head coaches have assistances and others trying to help give you the edge. Wayne feels that the head coaching role is a people manager role. “You have got to get on with players, you have to get them in the right head set because without the right mind set you are never going to get the best out of your players. Wayne Bennett is probably the best example. Then you have got to surround yourself with coaches that complement your strength and that’s depending on what type of head coach where your strengths are. You might need someone to be more of an assistant coach, you might need someone to do your defense but as a head coach you have got to oversee all this sort of stuff. So it’s very much a leadership role.”

Wayne became coach of Balmain in 1994 and he found that very difficult because the club wasn’t financially able to bring some the best players / top players to the club so they concentrated on developing there-own talent. Also in his second year of coaching the Super League war started which was a difficult time for everyone and Wayne felt that it left a big stain on the game. Balmain merged with Wests to form the West Tigers in 2000. At the same time Wayne coached New South Wales for three years and coached them to a 3-0 series whitewash of Queensland in 2000. He relished coaching New South Wales but felt fatigued because of coaching two sides at the same time. Wayne also felt that because Balmain didn’t have a lot funds to have a huge coaching team he was doing a lot of work himself, to give the Tigers an edge. “It got to the point where I had a three years’ contract with the Tigers and I actually left after one year because I just wasn’t seeing my family and I just couldn’t give any more hours to the club.”

Since Wayne played he feels that the salary cap, that has had a significant role in making the NRL one of the most evenly contested elite sporting competitions in the world. “The salary cap is there to even out the players so that the wealthy clubs can’t stockpile all the players and the players get shared around all the clubs. I think the salary cap has been something that has added a lot to the competition.”

Another area that has improved dramatically is the recovery methods for guys compared to when he played in the 1980’s. Wayne’s recovery method after a tough game was to try and have a fair bit of carbohydrates and protein, stretch down after the match and the day after do a light weight training session. He feels that something that today scientific training, recovery methods would have prolonged his career. “Back then the front rowers trained exactly the same way as the wingers. Nowadays there is a different way to train for the different position because their sport specific”.

When Wayne played the interchange rule was if you were subbed off by your coach, you never came back on. He also feels that interchange rule has been a game changer since he played and has helped players last longer in the game. “Nowadays the bigger players are not having to play a whole game. That on and off nature tends to prolong there playing career which nowadays in the highly paid sport that it is can equate to a lot of income which is important to the players.”

Wayne played with some of the superstars the game has ever seen. At club level he enjoying playing with Garry Jack, Benny Elias, Paul Sironen and Steve Roach because they were constantly good at their craft week in and week out. He felt that the best week in and week out player he played with at representative level and against at club level was Peter Sterling and the most skillful he played with at representative level and against at club level was Wally Lewis. Today Wayne runs his own company called Wayne Pearce Advantage. Wayne has been doing this for fifteen years and he runs leadership programs for companies “I took a whole lot of the team work and leadership across to business and I run programs both motivation and team work programs for businesses just helping them get more out of there people.”