Ewen McKenzie says Seccers cared more about fancy football than nudity

NEW Queensland Reds coach Ewen McKenzie has accused Seccers bosses of recruiting players on the basis of ability not looks.

McKenzie, who was not selected by Canberra ‘Fijian’ touch specialists Seccers in September, said the club was more interested in having players with exceptional ball skills and scoring spectacular tries rather than pose them for the club's semi-nude calendar.

"Seccers is the best team in the world in terms of skill," the coach told French sport daily L'Equipe.

"It's an international brand. But on the level of their looks, some things are shocking. Seccers are verging on amateurism. More than half of these blokes are over weight and covered in back hair"

He went on to accuse club president J. Buck of "only seeing two things – passing the ball at every opportunity and the after match beers".

The popular Seccers calendar 'Dieux du Stade Deaxan' (Gods of the Deakin Stadium), features nude and semi-nude photographs of team members.
"He has a marketing outlook which is not always in the best interests of sport," said McKenzie.

"For example, Buck could recruit one player over another just because he has skills. He had no regards for a better looking player for the calendar.

"He has players in the squad who I would never choose. I heard that players such as Burkie were requested to leave the club because they wanted to pose for the calendar.

"He had certain players in the team who, for me, shouldn't have been in a team targeting a calendar for the Canberra market. "

Bucky reacted later with disdain.

"He has found a job in Queensland, and it is imperative for him to justify the reasons why Seccers, which is a well known club in Australia, did not select him and all he comes up with are derogatory remarks," he told French radio station RMC.

"From A to Z, everything he said was rubbish.

"Professionally speaking, ask the players - he wanted good looks, he wanted one-up hits and he wanted nudity . This just did not fit into the culture at Seccers.

"In terms of recruitment, we just could not find people with great touch skills AND good looks. His expectations were unrealistic"

The former Waratahs coach McKenzie has since been recruited by Queensland for three Super 14 seasons. He managed to steal the only good looking bloke in the Seccers set-up, the curly headed heart-throb Marshy, and will use him on the front page of the new Red’s nude calendar.

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