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THE BEAUTIFUL BEACHSIDE suburb of Coogee in Sydney is where Mike Catt now calls home.
With its glorious sunshine, white sand beach, and crystal-clear waters, it might seem like a world away, but Catt is happy that there are many reminders of Dublin even in Coogee.
Having spent five enjoyable, successful seasons working as an assistant coach with Andy Farrell’s Ireland, Catt enjoys hearing from the many Irish expats around the place.
“It’s like little Ireland here, Irish accents everywhere,” he says.
Catt is now attack coach for the Waratahs, who face Farrell’s Lions in Sydney next Saturday. There are many familiar faces in the Lions’ ranks. Farrell has four of his Ireland assistants with him, a host of backroom staff, and 16 Irish players.
Catt is looking forward to catching up. He shares great memories with them, including their 2023 Grand Slam, 2024 Six Nations title, and 2022 series success in New Zealand. Catt still has a strong sense of “what if” about the 2023 World Cup.
He speaks fondly about Irish rugby and is a huge admirer of Farrell’s leadership, so it was difficult for Catt to walk away from the Ireland set-up last summer following the tour to his native South Africa. But family came first.
His son, Ellis, was with him in Ireland and loved playing rugby in Blackrock College but Catt’s two daughters, Evie and Erin, were in the UK and his wife, Ali, was over and back non-stop.
“I was just like, ‘What am I doing?’” says Catt. “I needed to spend time with my family. I wanted us all to be together.
“I asked Faz if I would be able to commute and he said no. Fair play, from day one he said he wanted me to be in Ireland and he stuck by that. And I had the most amazing time there.”
So Catt started to look for his next job. Australian coach Dan McKellar was in charge of Leicester and gave Catt a shout. When McKellar then had to move on from Tigers at the end of the 2023/24 season, he got the top job back at home with the Waratahs. He called Catt again and landed his man on a three-year deal.
Catt wanted to get back into club rugby for the first time in over a decade because of the day-to-day coaching aspect, yet Super Rugby having a relatively short season was appealing, as was the chance to work in a different part of the world. Ali’s father lives in Brisbane and they have friends elsewhere on the east coast.
So far, only Catt and 14-year-old Ellis have made the full-time move over, setting up a “little man cave,” but the girls are due to follow in a month, with important studies completed in the UK.
Five years with Ireland have left an imprint on Catt. He lists off Farrell, Paul O’Connell, Simon Easterby, David Nucifora, Johnny Sexton, Garry Ringrose, Tadhg Beirne, and Tadhg Furlong as examples of the “calibre of people” he worked with.
“It was just their want to be successful,” says Catt. “It’s just incredible how good Irish rugby is with the limited number of players there. It’s unbelievable how successful they are. I don’t think people appreciate that at all.
“Irish people are amazing people, that work ethic across the board. One of the biggest things is that there were no egos in Ireland team.
“You know, you just wish that… the Grand Slam wasn’t enough, you know, we needed something bigger than that and unfortunately the cards don’t fall like that. That’s sport, but what I’ve learned out of that was unbelievable.”
Catt joined Ireland after four years with Italy and worked closely with Farrell on the attack, which suffered from teething issues in the first year but gradually became world-leading and was mimicked by other teams.
“We got that understanding into the players and they started to be curious enough for it to happen,” says Catt.
“We coached the decision-making. It did look like we were very structured and yes, we were but the decision-making and the coaching of that and the calmness that you do it in, that was where I think we took the game to another level.”
Upskilling the Irish tight five forwards was key to Ireland’s plans to cut teams apart with their phase-play attack, with Farrell and Catt taking inspiration from the highly-skilled All Blacks team that won the 2011 and 2015 World Cups.
Making Irish players fitter than anyone was another important measure, while Sexton was highly influential in creating that brilliant Irish attack.
But Catt underlines that Farrell is the brains and heart of everything good Ireland have done in recent years.
The first thing he highlights is Farrell’s exceptional technical and tactical knowledge of the game, something Catt finds even more impressive given Farrell’s rugby league background. The Ireland and Lions boss is a huge student of union and Catt says Farrell can discuss the angle of props’ elbows in scrums with as much knowledge as he can attack shape or defence systems.
Secondly, there is Farrell’s searing honesty and ability to give players precise and consistent messages. Catt’s record as a player was remarkable. He won the 2003 World Cup in England, two Grand Slams, three other Five/Six Nations titles, toured with the Lions twice, and was part of a Bath team that won the Heineken Cup and three Premierships. His coaching career has included roles with London Irish, England [working alongside Farrell], Italy, Ireland, and now the Waratahs. So he’s a good judge of authenticity.
“I’ve worked with so many head coaches in the past that, as a player, you look at him and you go, ‘Yeah, that’s just bullshit,’” says Catt. “You know they’re just saying it for the sake of saying it.
“Whereas Faz has the knack of just being totally genuine, and what he says is so relevant in that moment.”
And for all the talk of the happy camps Farrell creates, Catt says there is never any confusion around the main goal of his teams.
“We had such fun. Faz loves a drink, he loves a song on the guitar, he loves the social, but it’s about winning.
“If you can get the balance right, great, but it’s not about good environments and stuff. It’s about winning. This Lions tour is about winning.”
Catt and the Waratahs hope to put a spanner in the Lions’ works on Saturday.
His first season with the Sydney side has been enjoyable and challenging. They started the campaign brightly but faded away and finished with six wins from 14 games, missing out on the play-offs.
The last few years have been fairly tumultuous for the Tahs and they are in the process of a rebuild in their squad and staff, all while playing in the “pretty brutal competition” that is Super Rugby Pacific.
Catt loves working hands-on with players every day, so different to the on-off nature of international coaching windows. One of the biggest differences he has seen between Irish players and their Aussie counterparts is how obsessed they are with rugby. He recounts how many Irish players would watch Super Rugby, Top 14, and anything else they could in their spare time. There are a few union nerds in the Waratahs squad too, but many others tune into rugby league, Aussie rules, and other sports when they’re away from the club’s training base.
Catt explains that there are lots of Australian players who struggle with kicking technique and strategy because they simply don’t kick the ball much when they’re growing up. The good weather lends itself to keeping the ball in hand, which can cause issues down the line when Aussie teams clash with tactically astute Kiwi sides in Super Rugby or step up into the kick-heavy international game.
The competition for eyeballs in Australian sport is intense and the reality is that rugby union is well down the pecking order. There are nine NRL clubs in Sydney, two AFL sides, as well as football, cricket, basketball, and netball teams.
Catt says that you wouldn’t know the Lions were coming to town apart from the odd banner here and there.
“If you’re not winning, you don’t get a sniff. We had a really good start to the season and then there were 20,000 people turning up and there was a real buzz about it but it drops very quickly when you lose because of what you’re competing against.
“This is why I think Australia needs to have a good Lions tour. World rugby needs the Wallabies to be successful. Same with the Waratahs, we need to start winning for us to get bums on seats and inspire kids at a younger age to start loving the game again.”
Catt explains how he went to watch his son play in the New South Wales U14 state championships a few weeks ago and was blown away.
“I couldn’t believe what I was watching, the talent was phenomenal and you had 115kg kids who are 14,” says Catt.
“The athleticism and skillset was mind-blowing and the question was, ‘Where do they all go?’ A lot of them get snapped up by the NRL because they’re promised the financial reward is much earlier than in union. That’s just where we’re at and changing that is exceptionally hard. So the Wallabies have to be successful, the Waratahs have to start winning for us to change that momentum.”
Australian rugby did manage to get a young NRL star back across to union in time for this Lions series. Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii didn’t come cheap but he has adapted impressively so far, shining for the Wallabies last autumn and for the Tahs this year in Super Rugby.
Suaalii has overcome a fractured jaw to return to fitness ahead of the Lions series and Catt says the Lions and the rest of the rugby world will have to watch out.
“He is gonna be exceptional,” says Catt. “First and foremost, he’s just an incredible athlete. Like freakishly, Israel Folau-type. He’s 21 years old, he hasn’t played a tonne of rugby union, but his professionalism is through the roof.
“He’s going to have a few bumpy roads, just part of the journey, but he’s come in and he’s shown a lot of senior players, especially at the Waratahs, what it actually means to really want something.
“I think the next two to three years for Joseph Suaalii is very special. Australian rugby needs guys like Joseph Suaalii.”
Suaalii mainly played at fullback for the Waratahs this year, although Catt reckons Joe Schmidt may use him at outside centre for the Wallabies.
And he cites Waratahs wing Max Jorgensen, who is also in Schmidt’s squad, as “unbelievably good” as an athlete and in his feel for the game. Jorgensen is one to watch “very, very closely,” according to Catt.
While those stars are in Wallabies camp preparing for the Lions, the rest of the Waratahs are working hard for Saturday’s huge occasion against Farrell’s tourists.
Catt was in Australia with the Lions as a player in 2001, so he knows exactly how special all of this will be.
“It’s huge. It only comes around once every 12 years. So they’re very, very fortunate to get this opportunity. And where we are as a squad, a lot of our guys are young, they’re going to get an experience playing against the best.
“Not all of them will play for the Wallabies, so for them to do it in front of a packed-out stadium is huge. We haven’t had that this year. It’s a brilliant challenge.”
The Waratahs will undoubtedly be exceptionally well-briefed about what to expect from an Andy Farrell team.
- This article was updated at 2.00pm on 29 June to correct 1999 to 2003 in the 25th paragraph.
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