Ex-teammates Kevin Walters and Petero Civoniceva reveal what life under Brad Thorn will be like

WHEN former Crusaders coach Robbie Deans spotted Brad Thorn doing shuttle runs alone after a brutal pre-season session, he asked him “why?”. Thorn replied “because I hate them”.

PICTURE the scene: a sideline of Wests Panthers under 15s game in Brisbane, two old footy mates watching their boys.

One is Kevin Walters and the other is Brad Thorn; former Broncos teammates and the current Queensland league and union coaches, respectively.

On the menu for discussion? Very rarely footy, or the professional variety anyway.

“We don’t talk coaching that much,” Walters says.

“It’s just about life and how the kids are going, all that stuff.

“He’s pretty safe and secure as a coach. He knows what he needs to do.”

Brad Thorn’s uncompromising approach to rugby will drive Queensland forward.

If Reds fans had any doubts about whether Bradley Carnegie Thorn will make a successful switch to coaching, perhaps this is your sign.

With an array of coaching contacts at his disposal from a storied career — Walters, Wayne Bennett, Robbie Deans, Graham Henry — Thorn has leaned on precisely none of them for a how-to playbook.

He’ll do it his way.

“Brad is very much his own man,” Deans says.

HIGGINBOTHAM: Captain’s agony driving Reds’ revival

In Melbourne the Reds will go into Super Rugby battle for the first time under Thorn, who was elevated at breakneck speed to Queensland’s head coach last year after Nick Stiles’ departure.

Exactly how the Thorn-forged Reds will perform is one of the more fascinating elements of Australian rugby this year.

Here is a proven winner with premierships, World Cups and success in every team and code he played, given the job of rebuilding one of the country’s most underperforming sides. As a rookie coach.

Thorn didn’t hesitate and few of his ex-teammates doubt he’ll succeed at Ballymore too. They just can’t picture any other outcome.

“It was always a nice feeling looking around the dressing room and seeing his face there,” Walters says.

Petro Civoniceva says Brad Thorn not only raises the bar, he holds the whole thing up.

“He was always very reliable and you knew when things got tough in a game, he’d be the first bloke there to put his hand up and do whatever he had to. What I liked most about him, he was a winner — and he did it in multiple codes. That’s not a coincidence.”

Apart from the odd flare-up of controversy — such as the dumping of Quade Cooper — Thorn has been working his young Reds squad behind closed doors for months. At his insistence, they’ve barely done any media. Just like Thorn, it’s been no talk, all action.

Former Broncos teammate Petero Civoniceva can imagine Thorn’s domain.

“When I first arrived into the Broncos set-up, I couldn’t believe how hard the boys trained,” Civoniceva said.

“The bar was so high, and Thorny was the one holding it up there. For any young fella who walked into that weights room or onto the training paddock, there was a standard you had to uphold if they were going to make it. If you couldn’t, see you later.

“You had to win his respect. And I remember talking to a few Crusaders boys and they said as soon as Thorny went to rugby over there, all of a sudden that standard went up there too. Everyone had to go with him.”

Former Broncos and Maroons Kevin Walters says Thorn is a winner, plain and simple. Picture: Annette Dew

Thorn’s reputation is one of a hard taskmaster, focused entirely on black-and-white effort levels, not promises or PR.

But while the Reds have been in lock-down, enough has seeped out to paint a picture of Thorny-more.

Having used a modern new weights room for several years, Thorn last year moved the team to Queensland’s “B” gym: a run-down shed out the back. It is off limits to all bar the team.

The wall posters of Queensland stars in Ballymore’s hallways now have no heads. Faces have been peeled away because in Thorn’s world, no individual is bigger than the team.

And people still have to earn Thorn’s respect. Only when a player is deemed to have trained hard enough does Thorn give the nod for their name to be put on a locker. It is now a big day when players arrive and a name has gone up. Some remain blank.

Bennett used to do the 8km time trial at the Broncos in the pre-season — to shame those who couldn’t beat him — and Civoniceva says the talk is Thorn, at 44, is still outgunning some youngsters when they lift “tin” in the gym.

Brad Thorn won three premierships with the Broncos.

Physical strength and mental strength go hand-in-hand for Thorn, though, and that has been the pre-season focus at the Reds.

Deans recalled a story from Thorn’s first pre-season at the Crusaders, when the team was doing four or five brutal sessions a day.

Young players were so knackered they’d fall asleep in their downtime but in one break Deans spotted Thorn on the field, doing extras.

“I wandered across and said to him, ‘Mate, what are you up to?’,” Deans said.

“He said ‘I’m just doing some shuttles coach’. I said: ‘Yes I can see that, but why?’

“And his answer was, ‘Because I hate them’.

“He was training his mind. He’s a competitor, in everything he does.”

Asked to predict what attributes a Thorn team will possess, Walters and Civoniceva offer the same answer.

“They’ll be aggressive, and have an attitude of never giving up,” Walters says. “Same as him.”

Civoniceva: “That’s the type of leader you want among young men.”

Originally published as Ex-teammates Kevin Walters and Petero Civoniceva reveal what life under Brad Thorn will be like