Indigenous Sport Month: Wests Tigers assistant Ronnie Griffiths, the NRL’s only Aboriginal coach

The NRL’s only Aboriginal coach has earned his position the hard way, initially working for free and driving 350km a day, but it beats being overlooked because of the colour of his skin.

Wests Tigers assistant coach Ronnie Griffiths. Picture: Tim Hunter

Ronnie Griffiths is the best Aboriginal coach anywhere in the NRL.

Haven’t heard of him? You aren’t alone.

But know that every morning before dawn, and with his wife Chantal and children Warrali and Kiata still sleeping, this proud Gomeroi man rises in the darkness of his Maitland home and readies for yet another long commute to Wests Tigers HQ.

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For three years now, this Tigers assistant has been driving 350km a day. Initially, for no money either.

With Griffiths spending the entire 2019 season working for free, and while also holding down a second job down in the Hunter Valley coal mines, just to prove his worth to head coach Michael Maguire. Which he knew would be no easy thing.

Ronnie Griffiths is an assistant coach to Michael Maguire at Wests Tigers. Picture: Tim Hunter

“Because you look across the NRL coaching ranks,” Griffiths says. “There aren’t many Aboriginal faces. In fact, I might be the only one.”

So we checked with the NRL.

He is. Which surely reads as ugly as it feels to write.

Especially given Indigenous footballers not only make up 12 per cent of the NRL, or 15 per cent of those players in Origin I, but also some of the modern era’s greatest names — men such as Johnathan Thurston, Greg Inglis, Gorden Tallis, Latrell Mitchell, Justin Hodges, Sam Thaiday and Cody Walker.

But coaches?

While Laurie Daley has overseen the NSW Origin team in recent years, and still heads the Indigenous All Stars side, no Aboriginal man has coached first grade since the late great Arthur Beetson at Eastern Suburbs and Cronulla, 27 years ago.

Laurie Daley had a stint as NSW coach. Picture: Gregg Porteous

Which is why each morning, while so many of us are sleeping, Griffiths drives.

“As an Aboriginal man, this hasn’t been an easy slog for me,” the 43-year-old says of his career in rugby league. “Which isn’t to bash anyone. That’s not what my story is about.

“But I will say that to get my opportunity, to get where I am right now, I’ve had to do things better than a lot of other people.”

Which is partly, he concedes, representative of Australian history.

“For so long in this country, Aboriginal people have fought for recognition and equality,” he says. “And just like past generations have helped lay the platform for us, so now it’s our turn to create greater opportunity for our own children.

“Because with opportunity comes success.”

Yet to understand where the NRL, specifically, must change, we must first know the issues a man like Griffiths has faced.

Asked about the impact of racism on his coaching career, which started in the Newcastle competition with clubs like Maitland and Kurri Kurri, he shrugs: “I’ve experienced racism in every facet of my life.

“With coaching, it hasn’t been so much things said directly to me as what has happened around me, decisions made. But I’ve experienced racism in sports, in my work, everywhere.

“Just the other day my daughter came home from school having been subjected to racism.

“She’s 10.”

Ever felt like being black has cost you a job in rugby league?

“Yeah, I do,” Griffiths continues, voice softening. “Before getting this opportunity with Wests Tigers, I applied for numerous roles within the game.

“And sometimes, people better qualified than me got the job.

“Which is great. But I have no doubt, at others times, I’ve also missed out for that reason.”

Ronnie Griffiths says he has experienced racism in every facet of his life. Picture: Tim Hunter

Which is why this Tigers assistant is now so passionate about bringing more coaches to Australian sport.

Aware, undoubtedly, the problem is not limited to rugby league, with the AFL also boasting just two coaches of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander background — Richmond VFL coach Xavier Clarke and Western Bulldogs development coach Travis Varcoe.

Elsewhere, a 2017 Western Sydney University study revealed across all sports, Indigenous Australians make up just 0.8 per cent of the coaching ranks.

So could part of the problem, we ask Griffiths, be embedded in that perception of the Indigenous athlete as natural wonder?

Rarely, for example, do we talk about the smarts of a black footballer.

With players like, say, Cody Walker instead hyped as all instinct, flair and gifts from above.

“Certainly that’s a good point,” says Griffiths, who first coached the South Sydney No.6 a decade ago, as part of the Mindaribba Warriors side he led to the 2011 Koori Knockout title.

“Because in the case of Cody Walker, he has an innate understanding of rugby league.

“Can really pick a game apart.

“It’s the same now at Wests Tigers with James Roberts, whose football IQ is extremely high. Yet whenever anyone mentions his name, it’s all about Jimmy the Jet.

“We talk about so many of these guys being ‘gifted’. Yet they’re incredibly intelligent footballers who’ve worked extremely hard to get where they are.”

Same deal Griffiths, who grew up in a family where his father Rick, every year in the late 1980s, would organise a rugby league camp for young Indigenous children at Newcastle University.

“My dad was ahead of his time,” the Tigers assistant explains. “And had to be.

“Growing up, he came from nothing.

“And apart from finding a path out of poverty for himself, he also wanted to help other Aboriginal people find their own path to self-determination.

“And sport, he always thought, was the perfect way to do that.

“A great conduit for delivering his message.”

All of which little Ronnie soaked in.

Arthur Beetson (right) was a successful coach with Queensland and Australia. Picture: Peter Kurnik

Same as every year, he would sit in on those coaching sessions from the likes of Wayne Pearce, Ricky Walford and Jeff Hardy.

His early education toward a life which — thanks to the help and influence of so many others, including cousin Wayne Griffiths, who coached the Gunnedah Bulldogs — eventually saw him not only overseeing Newcastle first grade teams, or the Koori Knockout premiers, but a NSW Indigenous U16s boasting the likes of Kotoni Staggs, Jesse Ramien and Connor Watson.

“But still there was no correlation between that work and a pathway to the NRL,” he said. “I’d been coaching 12 years and still couldn’t see a way in.”

So as for what happened next?

“I went and created one,” he says.

Specifically, at the inaugural NRL Indigenous Coaches Conference in 2019, where Maguire was among the guest speakers. “After the seminar was over, I spoke with a friend of mine, Paul Ralph, who also knew Madge really well,” Griffiths said. “And I asked for a meeting.

“At the time, I knew how crucial it was to get myself in the shop front window. So when I finally met up with Madge, I just offered to volunteer my time at Wests Tigers for 12 months.

“Which meant a lot of sacrifice for my family. But without taking that opportunity I wouldn’t be where I am now.”

Wests Tigers coach Michael Maguire gave Ronnie Griffiths his big break as an NRL assistant coach. Picture: Getty Images

Which is why Griffith is now looking to create pathways for other Indigenous Australians to join the coaching ranks that, up in Queensland, sees the likes of Matty Bowen, Justin Hodges and Scott Prince involved in various roles.

While at the Roosters, fellow First Nations man Travis Touma is High Performance Manager.

“Personally, I’m so grateful that Madge has a passion for developing Aboriginal talent,” he said. “Ever since our very first meeting, he’s wanted to provide that opportunity for me to live out my dream. And it’s something both he and the Tigers continue to embrace with the many initiatives this club is rolling out.”

But as for becoming an NRL head coach himself?

Griffiths isn’t sure what will happen.

Regardless, every morning he drives.

“Because people can do all the studies they like about Aboriginal coaches,” he said. “At the end of the day, they’re just that — studies. If we want to change the participation numbers, we have to change the perception of Indigenous coaches.

“And to do that, I need to be here.”

Originally published as Indigenous Sport Month: Wests Tigers assistant Ronnie Griffiths, the NRL’s only Aboriginal coach