Trbojevic tackle technique can save NRL: Gillmeister

Joel Gould | August 24, 2023

If every NRL player tackled like Manly’s Jake Trbojevic there would be far fewer concussions and suspensions in the game, Australia’s defence coach Trevor Gillmeister says.

Gillmeister was on staff with the Kangaroos in their successful Rugby League World Cup campaign last year.

As a player for Australia, Queensland and in his 233-game first-grade career he was one of the best tacklers rugby league has ever seen. 

Gillmeister is adamant his old-school technique of bending the back and tackling attackers under the ball are as relevant today as they were when he cut opponents in half and earned the nickname ‘The Axe’.

The 59-year-old tears out what little hair he has remaining when he watches NRL players go into defensive situations and chest-tackle opponents. 

Often carnage results, with players knocked out, penalised, put on report and suspended.

Gillmeister’s under-the-ball tackling is a different approach entirely.

“We still practise that with the Australian team,” Gillmeister told AAP.

“Most of the technique that I taught the players at the World Cup was around bending your back and getting in under the ball. That is all we did, and it worked.

“I have people in the game tell me they don’t want to tell blokes to tackle around the thighs or ribs because they get concussion. 

“I say, ‘Are you kidding me?’. You are not teaching them properly if they are doing that all the time.

“It is a boxing principle. You have one leg in front of the other – whichever leg suits you – so you can move your head out of the way.

“Jake Trbojevic is the best. Each time he tackles a bloke for Manly, NSW or Australia they play the ball and bend over again because he’s taken the wind out of them.

“He wears them down. You keep hitting blokes in the thighs, the ribs, the thighs, the ribs they eventually get fatigued and make mistakes.

“People in the game forget the long-term impact of that. They only look at the short term.”

Gillmeister outlined a key reason so many tackles go wrong in the modern game.

“The big front-rowers turn into the tackle and the bloke who comes in chest-on in defence cops the shoulder right on his chin,” he said.

“Maybe I am a dinosaur but you would save a lot of blokes getting concussion and suspended if you changed their tackling technique.

“It is about not getting your head caught in the wrong position, as they are when they are chest-on. 

“If I am a player now I want the bloke teaching the defence to look after me and think about my long-term prospects in the game.”

Gillmeister understands the thinking behind the current tackling style but said it was based on faulty reasoning.

“It all comes back to the coaches. They want their players to chest (tackle) blokes,” he said.

“It is a hangover from all the wrestling days, to try and stand the attackers up and hold them up to get more time in the play-the-ball.

“Now we find players who have poor technique will get found out with the six-again rule.

“They get fatigued and can’t chest them all the time. If you want a slow play-the-ball there is no better way than cutting someone in half and getting them on their back.

“Hearing the wind come out of them is the best sound ever on the footy field.”

Gillmeister said a key to Brisbane’s success this year has been forwards including Pat Carrigan and Kobe Hetherington cutting ball runners in half with Trbojevic-style defence, and forcing errors.

“Pat Carrigan wasn’t perfect at it at the World Cup early but he worked hard on it. Jake has been doing it all his life and was straight on board,” he said.

“Even big Lindsay Collins started to do it towards the end of the tour.

“I have got my own tackling academy and I teach kids these techniques.

“Big blokes want you to tackle them up around the chest so they can pump their legs. A lot of the time they don’t even hit the ground. But they hate getting hit low.

“I’m not being a smart arse, but I could nearly run the ball today at some of these blokes that chest you all the time. 

“There is no way I’d want to run the ball at Jake Trbojevic. Give me a break. No chance.”

The right mentality is also integral to the Gillmeister approach, and it’s one he learned from the late Barry ‘Bunny’ Reilly – the original ‘Axe’ at the Sydney Roosters.

“Bunny Reilly was so good for me when I was at the Roosters because he was a small bloke like me,” Gillmeister said.

“Arthur Beetson always told me to do what Bunny told me. Arthur said, ‘You are both small and you are both mad’. I told Arthur that was a bit harsh on Bunny.”