A “proud” Steve Hansen has praised his daughter’s efforts after being named an assistant coach to Wayne Smith at the Black Ferns, saying Whitney “deserves a crack” at the international women’s game.
Hansen spoke to 1News on Friday after Whitney was named as part of the Black Ferns’ new coaching set-up, which will be led by fellow former All Blacks coach Smith.
“As a father you’re very proud - she's worked hard with her coaching and she's gone a long way,” Hansen told 1News.
“What better way than to work than with three of the best coaches that New Zealand's ever produced in Smithy, Ted [Sir Graham Henry] and Crono [Mike Cron].
“It’s a great opportunity for her but she's worked hard for it and deserves a crack.”
Whitney was promoted on Thursday after working an intern coaching role with the Black Ferns under former coach Glenn Moore for the last two years.
She was also an assistant coach for the Matatū Super Rugby Aupiki squad earlier this season under Blair Baxton.
She played 111 games for Canterbury University in a number of positions including the entire front row, blindside flanker and No.8.
“She was a player who liked to think about the 'why' and 'how' things worked,” Hansen said.
“Naturally what comes with that is when you finish playing, you start coaching and she did that, she's spent a long time serving at the University club in Christchurch and started coaching the team she was playing for and it just went from there.”
Despite following her World Cup-winning father’s footsteps, Hansen said he hasn’t had to offer her much advice in her coaching journey.
“She's a smart cookie and a teacher by trade anyway and understands the importance of getting the message across so people understand why they need to do things and how they need to do them and when to do them and she's got good people skills,” he said.
“Our chats are usually about after games have been had and things we could do different or what did I see or what did she see.
“She's done it all by herself and I'm really proud of her.”
“We're extremely proud and everyone in the family - we're the Brady bunch, there's a lot of us and I know just through the messaging that's been going on that everyone's really, really proud of her and it's her time to shine and we'll support her as much as we can and hopefully it goes well.”
With Smith only taking on the director of rugby role until the end of this year’s Rugby World Cup currently, talk of a successor is a topic on some punters’ minds.
Hansen said he was unsure if Whitney would be ready in six months for such a leap, but wouldn’t rule it out.
“I think that she has to show that she's worthy of doing that and she'll put every step forward to do so but you've got three people there that are great judges and, if nothing else, they'll be great teachers for her,” he said.
“If she's good enough to go on and do that then she will be but I think it doesn't matter what international team it is, it deserves to have the best coach available to them and it deserves to have the support of its national union so whoever they select after this next coach has to be the right person and has to be capable of doing the job.
“It's a long way away and what she just needs to concentrate on doing now is doing the best she can for this team in the next 180 days before this tournament comes and what falls out of that, falls out of it.
“I don't think she'll be thinking anything other than that, in knowing her how I do.”
And if anyone does, it’ll be the man that’s been there supporting her since day one.
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