How coaches cope with 'mental meltdown'

As the Stormers prepare for their Champions Cup Round of 16 face-off with French powerhouse Toulon, off-field events as much as the on-field prowess of the two teams have hogged the headlines.

Pierre Mignoni, who has resumed his post as Toulon coach after a sudden mid-season pause, said last week he had suffered a “breakdown” and had learned that coaching could kill.

The 49-year-old former France scrumhalf returned following the short mid-season break due to ‘burnout’.

“My body gave out on me,” Mignoni said in an interview, quoted on AFP, when asked about his decision to step aside following a loss to Clermont in the French Top 14 on February 14.

“I experienced what you might call a breakdown, a work overload,” the Toulon boss was quoted as saying.

“I felt it coming on, but you always have this feeling of being a superhuman.

“You’re always taking care of others and not much of yourself.

“It’s a fabulous job; you don’t count the hours, and you tell yourself it’ll be alright.

“But it’s not so much the workload on the field that’s heavy, it’s the mental load.

“And at one point, it really hit me hard. It wasn’t the defeat that put me in this state; it was the final straw, and my body gave out.”

In South Africa, there is the well-documented case of former Lions coach Swys de Bruin, who walked out on his team back in 2019.

De Bruin later explained that the scheduling of the Lions’ Super Rugby match against the Chiefs on Good Friday was one of the reasons he left the team’s tour of Australasia early.

The Lions coach flew back to South Africa on the eve of the fixture against the Chiefs in Hamilton, which they went on to win 23-17, citing personal reasons for his departure.

“The Lions are a Christian team, and I found it incredibly difficult to play on Good Friday,” he said later.

Back to Mignoni.

His case was thrust back into the spotlight ahead of the Champions Cup play-off face-off in Toulon on Saturday.

Stormers forwards coach Rito Hlungwani was asked about his view on the Mignoni case and how it may affect the Stormers’ coaching roster.

“It is a massive challenge in sport,” Hlungwani told a media scrum in the build-up to the game at Stade Mayol, a stadium overlooking the Toulon military harbour in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region of southeastern France, located on the French Riviera.

“It is one thing to lose a game and feel the pressure,” he added.

“However, sometimes you win games, and you still get that pressure.

“I think there can be much better support for coaches in this environment.”

* (WATCH as Stormers forwards coach Rito Hlungwani speaks about the ‘mental’ pressure faced by professional coaches…..)

Hlungwani stressed that the demands extended beyond the field, particularly for those balancing rugby with family life, who are also inevitably dragged into the high-pressure environment.

“We can go to France and do a good job. However, I’ve got three kids at home that I have to leave [behind],” he said.

“If it wasn’t for Jo, my better half, looking after the children and the household, I couldn’t perform as well.

“Hacjivah [Dayimani] has a young boy, and if Busi [his partner isn’t there], he doesn’t perform well.

“It’s the same for the players.

“Neethling [Fouché] has two young children, [captain] Ruhan [Nel] has a young child.

“All those things build up into pressure when you leave your family.

“The support is extremely important for coaches and players, because this is a high-pressure environment.

“As much as we love it, we as teams and unions start investing more in making sure that we look at mental health in a very serious light.”

Mignoni said the support of the Toulon President stopped him from walking away altogether.

“I asked myself if I had the strength and the desire to continue,” Mignoni told AFP, adding: “Bernard Lemaitre immediately told me that it was unthinkable for him that I would leave.

“He wanted me to take a break, even three months if necessary. Accepting that your coach takes a break is very rare.”

He said he recovered “step by step”.

@JanDKrugby
@rugby365com