The Leinster legend recently started an influential role as head of rugby performance for Auckland, who play in New Zealand’s National Provincial Championship [NPC].
This area of New Zealand is a hotbed of talent, but Auckland haven’t been able to convert that into trophies. They haven’t won the NPC since 2005. Nacewa is hoping to do something about that.
Their season begins in a fortnight but this week has allowed Nacewa to welcome some familiar faces to New Zealand, with Ireland in town for their Nations Championship clash with Ireland at Eden Park, where Auckland play their games.
Nacewa met his good friend Johnny Sexton on Friday.
“I’m always intrigued to catch up with Johnny and see what he thinks of life in coaching,” says 43-year-old Nacewa, who sports an Auckland Rugby fleece that looks more than a hint like Leinster gear.
“I met Johnny and Jamo [Gibson-Park] for lunch in 2022, when they won the series, so it’s been a while.”
It has long been known that Nacewa had a role in the previously unheralded Gibson-Park ending up in Leinster in 2016, which proved to be massively to the benefit of Ireland too.
Nacewa insists that “it wasn’t me at all” and instead praises the ability of Leinster’s Leo Cullen and Guy Easterby to scour the globe for talent.
But Nacewa did encourage Leinster to go for Gibson-Park, having worked with him at the Blues in between his own two stints with the Irish province.
“Jamo was always going to be that late developer,” says Nacewa of what he had seen.
“He just needed to really be a part of a system and an environment that 100% backed him, and he got that at Leinster. He just needed the backing.
“Once he got that foot in and proved himself, he’s become one of the best, if not the best, in the world.
“You look at Aaron Smith’s time with the All Blacks. I was lucky enough to talk to a couple of the All Blacks selectors when he was at his peak. Grant Fox would say at the time, the game plan is only possible because of Aaron Smith.
“He was the speed, he was the general, he just did it all. And Jamo has completely grown into that and is the heartbeat. When he’s on, good luck. There aren’t too many teams that keep up with him. It’s so cool to watch.”
Nacewa lifts the Pro14 trophy in 2018. James Crombie / INPHO
James Crombie / INPHO / INPHO
Nacewa’s pride in Gibson-Park’s achievement is palpable. His affection for Sexton is obvious. And his respect for Cullen shines through.
Although he’s been away from Leinster and Ireland for eight years now, there is still a deep grá there. He and his wife, Simone, enjoyed life in Dublin across a total of eight years in the Irish capital.
All four of their daughters - Mia, Ellie, Lucy and Laura – were born in Dublin. So today’s game between New Zealand and Ireland creates conflicting feelings.
“I think my wife asks every week, ‘Can we go back to Ireland?’” says Nacewa.
“She loved it. The girls love it. This is going to be a doozy at Eden Park, so I’m really looking forward to it. I want everyone to win.
“My girls still have their Irish jerseys and pull them out. They’re Johnny Sexton supporters. So the fact that he’s coaching, there are definitely split ties there.”
Within the last year, Nacewa and his wife have asked their girls whether they would want to go abroad again at some stage.
It was a hypothetical conversation simply because Nacewa is back in rugby, where you never know what’s around the corner
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One of them said, “Let’s go tomorrow,” one wants to finish school in New Zealand, another is cautiously keen on the idea, and the youngest was worried about missing football training on Saturday mornings.
“The fact that we’re having those conversations again is cool,” says Nacewa.
Would he like to return to Leinster as a coach or in the kind of role he has with Auckland? Cullen will step down as Leinster head coach in the summer of 2027, when it remains to be seen what happens with the remainder of the province’s coaching staff.
Nacewa loves the idea of going back to Leinster, although he stresses that his focus is on Auckland, where he has become a permanent member of staff.
“I’d never say no, of course not,” says Nacewa of the prospect of re-joining Leinster.
“I’ve been at Auckland and the Blues and Leinster. I’m now at Auckland, and I want to do everything I can to contribute to this, but would I want to go back to Leinster in the future?
“100%. If something came up, yeah, absolutely.
“I’m pretty loyal to what I do, to people that have given me an opportunity. I want to repay that. And this is what Auckland has done.
“They’ve backed me to come in and make a difference. And there’ll be a lot of pressure. This is a pressure cooker in Auckland. I like that.
“If I’m being honest, I haven’t had that feeling for a while.”
Nacewa with his family before leaving Leinster. Dan Sheridan / INPHO
Dan Sheridan / INPHO / INPHO
When Nacewa first left Leinster in 2013, he became a mental skills coach at the Blues but after he returned to Ireland and retired from playing for good in 2018, he wanted a total break from rugby.
He went into the world of finance, spending nearly five years enjoying a very different challenge. Unsurprisingly, he thrived there and also loved having his weekends back and being around his girls through their early school years.
He got an itch to return to sport eventually, though, and just over three years ago, he took on a job with High Performance Sport New Zealand [HPSNZ], an organisation that’s similar to Sport Ireland.
Nacewa’s role was as a ‘performance team leader,’ essentially helping to guide athletes across a wide range of Olympic sports such as rowing, cycling, equestrian, yachting and athletics.
His time with HPSNZ took in the 2024 Paris Olympics, where New Zealand won 20 medals, including 10 golds. Nacewa found it intriguing to work in a government-funded field, where forward planning is even more important than in rugby.
“Before you’re even going to get medals in Paris, you’re preempting what your next four-year cycle looks like,” says Nacewa.
“Who’s on the pathway? Who are going to be your next tier of athletes projecting four years forward? This was a different side of sport that I hadn’t seen.
“We’re even talking the 2032 Olympics in Brisbane. Those kids are still in school, and they probably don’t even know they’re going to be a 2032 Olympian. But we’re strategically trying to figure out how to invest in the pathway to maximise winning in 2032.”
Nacewa also enjoyed the “black and white” nature of those sports, where the stopwatch never lies.
As he learned huge amounts along the way, Nacewa always had it in mind that he would end up back in rugby.
“I wanted to understand the governance side of things before coming back to rugby,” he says. “If I only stayed in rugby, I only would have believed rugby’s version of things.”
It all means he was ideally placed to step into his new role at Auckland, who have big plans to make better use of the local talent.
Auckland Rugby has the biggest participation base in the country, the biggest schools rugby competition with some set-ups that are akin to professional rugby, as well as the big city population base that they’ll hope to see turning out in growing numbers at games in the NPC, which Nacewa says is enjoying a resurgence.
He has kept his rugby coaching eye in too. Nacewa has helped out with the First XV teams at a few Auckland schools over the years, as well as contributing to Super Rugby team Moana Pasifika’s analysis reviews.
He watches a lot of rugby, including nearly every Connacht game since Stuart Lancaster took over. Nacewa rarely misses a Leinster match. He’s all over Super Rugby and the international game, but he also tunes into teams like Toulouse, Bordeaux, Northampton and Bath whenever he can.
He didn’t want to become a rugby coach straight after retiring, but believes he may get into full-time coaching in the future.
“The way I wanted to coach, I’ve got to be all in, 100%,” says Nacewa. “I didn’t want to do that when I finished, turn into a nomad and do double the amount of hours as a player. The timing wasn’t right for me.
“Will it be in the future? Yeah, probably. I’ve always kept my hand in it.
“I wanted to get to the other side of the game; that’s what interests me most right now, not the actual coaching.”
Nacewa played under some of the leading coaches in rugby – Graham Henry, Pat Lam, Michael Cheika, Joe Schmidt, Cullen and Lancaster – and has harvested lots of knowledge from them along the way.
Nacewa remains in regular contact with Leo Cullen. Oisin Keniry / INPHO
Oisin Keniry / INPHO / INPHO
He remains in close contact with many of them. Indeed, he was on a call with Lancaster earlier this week, running some of his presentations past his former Leinster coach.
He hasn’t been surprised to see Connacht’s upturn in fortunes under Lancaster.
“I spoke to him just before it was announced, just understanding what he was going to do,” says Nacewa.
“He had this really detailed demographic breakdown of the players and where they’re at, age and stage, how many years, all these regions. It was sort of this perfect recipe for Stu’s skill set to come in and go, ‘We’re going this way, lads.’”
Nacewa was speaking to Leinster chief operations officer Easterby only two weeks ago, while he’s in regular contact with Cullen too.
He used to love going into Leinster’s training base at UCD early each morning for rugby chats with Cullen and their relationship has continued.
“We share ideas, bounce ideas off each other, talk about the next coaches coming through in New Zealand,” says Nacewa. “Leo’s always got his finger on the pulse around how the Chiefs are doing things, what the Hurricanes are doing, all of that.”
Nacewa says he learned a lot from Cullen during those Leinster years.
“I haven’t come across many coaches who can accurately forecast where they’re going to be in six months, 12 months, and then two years’ time,” he says.
“With all his experience, he’s got this innate ability to really project where Leinster are going to be, and how to build towards that.
“He’s always had the ability to do it, which probably speaks of the organisation as well. There’s never been a knee-jerk reaction to get rid of him. Leinster are consistently there at the right end of the season when they need to be, so there’s a lot going right.”
So there is real excitement on Nacewa’s part to now be in a similar role with Auckland, trying to win now and win later.
There are big challenges, including the ongoing rise of rugby league in New Zealand, but Nacewa says not to believe some of the doom and gloom about rugby union in this neck of the woods.
He says it’s all about rugby giving people a chance to truly feel part of something, whether that’s in the club game, the NPC, or on into an All Blacks jersey.
He felt that in Leinster and still does.
“I don’t commit to things and then bail easily,” says Nacewa, who will be at Eden Park today.
“I only played for Auckland and the Blues and Leinster. So when I’ve got an opportunity, I really want to do it well.
“It’s a good test for myself also, but being back in rugby opens up the world again, which is the right timing.”
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'My girls still have their Irish jerseys. They're Johnny Sexton supporters'
ISA NACEWA IS back in rugby.
The Leinster legend recently started an influential role as head of rugby performance for Auckland, who play in New Zealand’s National Provincial Championship [NPC].
This area of New Zealand is a hotbed of talent, but Auckland haven’t been able to convert that into trophies. They haven’t won the NPC since 2005. Nacewa is hoping to do something about that.
Their season begins in a fortnight but this week has allowed Nacewa to welcome some familiar faces to New Zealand, with Ireland in town for their Nations Championship clash with Ireland at Eden Park, where Auckland play their games.
Nacewa met his good friend Johnny Sexton on Friday.
“I’m always intrigued to catch up with Johnny and see what he thinks of life in coaching,” says 43-year-old Nacewa, who sports an Auckland Rugby fleece that looks more than a hint like Leinster gear.
“I met Johnny and Jamo [Gibson-Park] for lunch in 2022, when they won the series, so it’s been a while.”
It has long been known that Nacewa had a role in the previously unheralded Gibson-Park ending up in Leinster in 2016, which proved to be massively to the benefit of Ireland too.
Nacewa insists that “it wasn’t me at all” and instead praises the ability of Leinster’s Leo Cullen and Guy Easterby to scour the globe for talent.
But Nacewa did encourage Leinster to go for Gibson-Park, having worked with him at the Blues in between his own two stints with the Irish province.
“Jamo was always going to be that late developer,” says Nacewa of what he had seen.
“He just needed to really be a part of a system and an environment that 100% backed him, and he got that at Leinster. He just needed the backing.
“Once he got that foot in and proved himself, he’s become one of the best, if not the best, in the world.
“You look at Aaron Smith’s time with the All Blacks. I was lucky enough to talk to a couple of the All Blacks selectors when he was at his peak. Grant Fox would say at the time, the game plan is only possible because of Aaron Smith.
“He was the speed, he was the general, he just did it all. And Jamo has completely grown into that and is the heartbeat. When he’s on, good luck. There aren’t too many teams that keep up with him. It’s so cool to watch.”
Nacewa’s pride in Gibson-Park’s achievement is palpable. His affection for Sexton is obvious. And his respect for Cullen shines through.
Although he’s been away from Leinster and Ireland for eight years now, there is still a deep grá there. He and his wife, Simone, enjoyed life in Dublin across a total of eight years in the Irish capital.
All four of their daughters - Mia, Ellie, Lucy and Laura – were born in Dublin. So today’s game between New Zealand and Ireland creates conflicting feelings.
“I think my wife asks every week, ‘Can we go back to Ireland?’” says Nacewa.
“She loved it. The girls love it. This is going to be a doozy at Eden Park, so I’m really looking forward to it. I want everyone to win.
“My girls still have their Irish jerseys and pull them out. They’re Johnny Sexton supporters. So the fact that he’s coaching, there are definitely split ties there.”
Within the last year, Nacewa and his wife have asked their girls whether they would want to go abroad again at some stage.
It was a hypothetical conversation simply because Nacewa is back in rugby, where you never know what’s around the corner
One of them said, “Let’s go tomorrow,” one wants to finish school in New Zealand, another is cautiously keen on the idea, and the youngest was worried about missing football training on Saturday mornings.
“The fact that we’re having those conversations again is cool,” says Nacewa.
Would he like to return to Leinster as a coach or in the kind of role he has with Auckland? Cullen will step down as Leinster head coach in the summer of 2027, when it remains to be seen what happens with the remainder of the province’s coaching staff.
Nacewa loves the idea of going back to Leinster, although he stresses that his focus is on Auckland, where he has become a permanent member of staff.
“I’d never say no, of course not,” says Nacewa of the prospect of re-joining Leinster.
“I’ve been at Auckland and the Blues and Leinster. I’m now at Auckland, and I want to do everything I can to contribute to this, but would I want to go back to Leinster in the future?
“100%. If something came up, yeah, absolutely.
“I’m pretty loyal to what I do, to people that have given me an opportunity. I want to repay that. And this is what Auckland has done.
“They’ve backed me to come in and make a difference. And there’ll be a lot of pressure. This is a pressure cooker in Auckland. I like that.
“If I’m being honest, I haven’t had that feeling for a while.”
When Nacewa first left Leinster in 2013, he became a mental skills coach at the Blues but after he returned to Ireland and retired from playing for good in 2018, he wanted a total break from rugby.
He went into the world of finance, spending nearly five years enjoying a very different challenge. Unsurprisingly, he thrived there and also loved having his weekends back and being around his girls through their early school years.
He got an itch to return to sport eventually, though, and just over three years ago, he took on a job with High Performance Sport New Zealand [HPSNZ], an organisation that’s similar to Sport Ireland.
Nacewa’s role was as a ‘performance team leader,’ essentially helping to guide athletes across a wide range of Olympic sports such as rowing, cycling, equestrian, yachting and athletics.
His time with HPSNZ took in the 2024 Paris Olympics, where New Zealand won 20 medals, including 10 golds. Nacewa found it intriguing to work in a government-funded field, where forward planning is even more important than in rugby.
“Before you’re even going to get medals in Paris, you’re preempting what your next four-year cycle looks like,” says Nacewa.
“Who’s on the pathway? Who are going to be your next tier of athletes projecting four years forward? This was a different side of sport that I hadn’t seen.
“We’re even talking the 2032 Olympics in Brisbane. Those kids are still in school, and they probably don’t even know they’re going to be a 2032 Olympian. But we’re strategically trying to figure out how to invest in the pathway to maximise winning in 2032.”
Nacewa also enjoyed the “black and white” nature of those sports, where the stopwatch never lies.
As he learned huge amounts along the way, Nacewa always had it in mind that he would end up back in rugby.
“I wanted to understand the governance side of things before coming back to rugby,” he says. “If I only stayed in rugby, I only would have believed rugby’s version of things.”
It all means he was ideally placed to step into his new role at Auckland, who have big plans to make better use of the local talent.
Auckland Rugby has the biggest participation base in the country, the biggest schools rugby competition with some set-ups that are akin to professional rugby, as well as the big city population base that they’ll hope to see turning out in growing numbers at games in the NPC, which Nacewa says is enjoying a resurgence.
He has kept his rugby coaching eye in too. Nacewa has helped out with the First XV teams at a few Auckland schools over the years, as well as contributing to Super Rugby team Moana Pasifika’s analysis reviews.
He watches a lot of rugby, including nearly every Connacht game since Stuart Lancaster took over. Nacewa rarely misses a Leinster match. He’s all over Super Rugby and the international game, but he also tunes into teams like Toulouse, Bordeaux, Northampton and Bath whenever he can.
He didn’t want to become a rugby coach straight after retiring, but believes he may get into full-time coaching in the future.
“The way I wanted to coach, I’ve got to be all in, 100%,” says Nacewa. “I didn’t want to do that when I finished, turn into a nomad and do double the amount of hours as a player. The timing wasn’t right for me.
“Will it be in the future? Yeah, probably. I’ve always kept my hand in it.
“I wanted to get to the other side of the game; that’s what interests me most right now, not the actual coaching.”
Nacewa played under some of the leading coaches in rugby – Graham Henry, Pat Lam, Michael Cheika, Joe Schmidt, Cullen and Lancaster – and has harvested lots of knowledge from them along the way.
He remains in close contact with many of them. Indeed, he was on a call with Lancaster earlier this week, running some of his presentations past his former Leinster coach.
He hasn’t been surprised to see Connacht’s upturn in fortunes under Lancaster.
“I spoke to him just before it was announced, just understanding what he was going to do,” says Nacewa.
“He had this really detailed demographic breakdown of the players and where they’re at, age and stage, how many years, all these regions. It was sort of this perfect recipe for Stu’s skill set to come in and go, ‘We’re going this way, lads.’”
Nacewa was speaking to Leinster chief operations officer Easterby only two weeks ago, while he’s in regular contact with Cullen too.
He used to love going into Leinster’s training base at UCD early each morning for rugby chats with Cullen and their relationship has continued.
“We share ideas, bounce ideas off each other, talk about the next coaches coming through in New Zealand,” says Nacewa. “Leo’s always got his finger on the pulse around how the Chiefs are doing things, what the Hurricanes are doing, all of that.”
Nacewa says he learned a lot from Cullen during those Leinster years.
“I haven’t come across many coaches who can accurately forecast where they’re going to be in six months, 12 months, and then two years’ time,” he says.
“With all his experience, he’s got this innate ability to really project where Leinster are going to be, and how to build towards that.
“He’s always had the ability to do it, which probably speaks of the organisation as well. There’s never been a knee-jerk reaction to get rid of him. Leinster are consistently there at the right end of the season when they need to be, so there’s a lot going right.”
So there is real excitement on Nacewa’s part to now be in a similar role with Auckland, trying to win now and win later.
There are big challenges, including the ongoing rise of rugby league in New Zealand, but Nacewa says not to believe some of the doom and gloom about rugby union in this neck of the woods.
He says it’s all about rugby giving people a chance to truly feel part of something, whether that’s in the club game, the NPC, or on into an All Blacks jersey.
He felt that in Leinster and still does.
“I don’t commit to things and then bail easily,” says Nacewa, who will be at Eden Park today.
“I only played for Auckland and the Blues and Leinster. So when I’ve got an opportunity, I really want to do it well.
“It’s a good test for myself also, but being back in rugby opens up the world again, which is the right timing.”
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