WHEN Matt McRobert put his hand up to coach the Bathurst Bulldogs first XV this season, he knew there would be challenges, but he never anticipated just how big they would be.
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Yes he knew he'd have to deal with the pressure that comes with coaching the defending premiers of the Blowes Cup.
Yes with the depth of talent at Bulldogs he knew he'd have some tough selection decisions to make throughout the season.
But dealing with a season that was put on hold due to the coronavirus pandemic and even now, after a return to play target has been set, still having plenty of uncertainty is something McRobert says is "completely unprecedented."
"No-one ever envisaged anything like this happening. No-one was prepared for it and we're all just making it up as we go along with whatever information we can get from higher up," he said.
"We don't really know what sort of format the competition's going to take. Really what we are doing is trying to map out some ways we can prepare for whatever is in front of us.
"We had our training plan for each week and it was designed around five teams, four men's and a women's team, and having stations to train around and then go into our skills.
"We were going merrily along then COVID hit, so we've had to do what we can online without jeopardising the club in any way, shape or form."
Rewind 12 months and things were much different.
McRobert had returned to a senior coaching role with the Bulldogs and was relishing his job working with the first XV alongside Dean Oxley.
Bulldogs were sitting on a five from five record at this point and had earned a bonus point in four of their wins to be sitting on top of the ladder.
They went on to win the grand final on their home turf, beating a brave Orange Emus outfit.
That camaraderie and that community Bulldogs brings into your life is a really magic thing.
- Matt McRobert
"I hadn't been with the club with for 15 years until I came back last year. I had been around the club and helped out every now and then and of course went to a lot of games and watched the boys, but being back there after 15 years was a real privilege for me," he said.
"The names and the faces change but that camaraderie and that community Bulldogs brings into your life is a really magic thing.
"I helped Brian [Roberson] out a bit in the 2005 season, but my last season was 2004. I hadn't coached at a senior level at a club.
"I'd done Central West, the 20s and the seniors, I did that all up for seven years and I'd done a bit of work with The Scots School and to a lesser extent Stannies.
"But I hadn't had a senior coaching role for a long time and when I came back I realised how much I missed it. It's a great club, a proud club."
This season McRobert stepped up into the role of head coach and just as been the case in 2019, he had set about building a solid foundation in pre-season training.
He said around 75 percent of the premiership winning first grade squad had returned and that the talent pool through all the grades had Bulldogs in a strong position.
But just what those squads will look like if the green light is given to resume training, McRobert is unsure.
"A number of coaches over a number of years had done a very good job in making good Bulldogs. They were fantastic last year and we had a majority of them back, certainly our planning this year was with having pretty much the same squad," he said.
"We had a very strong first grade squad, a very strong second grade squad, a good group of colts coming through, we are going to be a very strong club moving into the future, be it 2020 or 2021.
"We were going to field a very strong squad, ours was a very experienced squad. A lot of them had been in the club and playing together for a long time.
"When the time comes, it's just a matter of what sort of effect COVID will have on numbers around the zone.
"On one hand you'd like to think that people are itching for a game and you get record numbers turn up, but on the other hand there is a bit of stress anxiety about it, what it means, and that could translate into less."
After the virus forced all Central West Rugby Union competitions to be put on hold, McRobert and the rest of the Bulldogs coaching staff had to adapt their plans.
Now with social distancing restrictions easing - as of Friday outdoor gatherings of up to 10 people will be permitted - McRobert and his staff could change things again. But there is still plenty of uncertainty.
"COVID closed down our gym and players aren't allowed to train in any more than pairs at the moment, so we've been putting out Tuesday, Thursday plans," McRobert said.
"They can really only be around fitness at the moment and the players are doing their best. We can't really monitor them because we don't have access to them.
"We can quite easily train in groups of 10 and go through an entire session, but of course more than 10 people turn up to training at one time.
"Whether we're allowed to have 10 people using one half of the field and 10 use the other and we split that over four halves of our two fields - we are not 100 percent sure what we are allowed to do yet.
"Really for us, the training structure that we had is going to be enough to start, if it's 10, if it's 20, if it's a bit less than that, we have enough to get by ... we have enough to pick up where we left off, our basic structures can be adapted to whatever lies ahead.
"We have to be patient and understand that there's things that not everyone knows - it's unprecedented."
While McRobert says "certainly we all miss the rugby and what it brings to us" he is mindful that any return to play or training has to be carefully considered.
He knows and agrees that health and safety, rather than the desire to play rugby, has to be the major consideration.
"As a coach, the first thing you do when you do your certificate is safety, so that has to be foremost in our planning - the safety of our players and their well being," he said.
"That's not just the physical either, it's also the mental health and well being because there has been a lot of stress and anxiety brought out as a result of this as well."
If rugby does get the green light for a July kick-off, McRobert would love for spectators to be allowed to watch his men in action.
"The thing with us is that we are a community rugby club and it's more than just the players. It's our support staff, our committee, our sponsors, our supporters. We would like to think that whatever rugby in the Central West looks like in 2020, that it includes everyone because that's the strength of rugby," he said.
"It is a community sport and Bulldogs in particular has thrived on that community support, we are very lucky. I don't want to say that's a caveat for us, but certainly it would be an important stipulation that whatever life looks like, it's as close as possible to what we previously had.
"We are not dinosaurs, we realise we have to adapt, but we are determined out community can play a role in whatever the season is from here on in."
