From AFL rookie to international rugby, Sean Yoshiura returns to Bond University to help the Wallaroos chase World Cup glory — with the backing of experience, research, and a philosophy built on belief.
Bond University alumnus Sean Yoshiura is a student of the game of rugby. He spends his work hours meticulously planning how to get the Wallaroos in peak condition for the World Cup. His free time is devoted to mapping the progress of the innovative coaches and high-performing rugby players around the world – in search of the next scientific advancement, piece of coaching philosophy or motivational approach he can absorb into his own rugby program. But it was a conversation with Collingwood AFL premiership coach Craig McRae more than a decade ago that has shaped his professional life.
At the time Yoshiura was a rookie at the Brisbane Lions where he earned the distinction of being the first Japanese-born player to be drafted onto an AFL list. McRae, then the reserves coach at the Lions, offered Yoshiura some simple encouragement that has become a personal compass through one of sport’s most colourful and untraditional journeys: Tokyo to Brisbane and back, China to Ireland, with a couple of stints at Bond University along the way, including a Bachelor of Exercise and Sports Science and master’s degree.
“At the end of the day, I just want you to believe in yourself,” McRae told him. “If you have more confidence and belief in your ability, that’s the one thing that will help more than anything else in your career moving forward.”
It landed with weight. “That’s something that I’ll never forget from Craig,” Yoshiura said. “You can see it in some of the footage from Collingwood, the way he instils a lot of belief in his players. It doesn't surprise me, and to see how much success he has had, it's just reinforces the good habits and good coaching styles that you see in successful coaches.”
That mindset became a cornerstone of Yoshiura’s own coaching philosophy: to create environments that build confidence, not just fitness. This week, Yoshiura returned to Bond University as the Head of Strength and Conditioning for the Wallaroos who are launching their Rugby World Cup campaign with a training camp at the place where his dual careers – academic and athletic – first intersected.
Breaking barriers with the Lions
Born in Tokyo to a Japanese father and a Tasmanian mother, Sean Yoshiura didn’t speak a word of English until the age of seven.
A natural long-distance runner, he represented Australia in cross-country before a chance encounter with a footy broadcast sparked a new passion. “I was flicking through the TV and saw Justin Leppitsch (the former Lions star),” he recalled. “I thought, I wonder what this sport is? A few days later I went past a footy oval close to my house and thought, why not give it a try?”
After a standout junior career Yoshiura was selected by the Lions in the 2009 draft. His one senior game would also make a great footy club trivia night question.
It was an exhibition game in Shanghai against Melbourne where he was thrown into the deep end, asked to curb the influence of one of the Demons’ biggest names – best and fairest winner Brent Moloney.
“It was quite incredible to finally get that opportunity,” Yoshiura said. “I was playing on Brent Moloney and tagging him, and it was pretty cool.”
He vividly remembers the professionalism of teammates like Simon Black and Luke Power. “Everything was done so immaculately. I learned so much from that.”
While injuries curtailed his playing career, they opened another door: strength and conditioning.
Bond, the Reds and a career in the making
After stepping away from AFL, Yoshiura continued to play in the State League with Mt Gravatt and returned to Bond to finish his Bachelor of Exercise and Sports Science.
“The class sizes were small and we had a really good professor, Chris McClellan,” he said. “To learn from him was incredible and I really enjoyed it.”
McLellan, a pioneer in the “S and C” space and a former Gold Coast Titans head of performance, was Bond’s first-ever PhD graduate in Health Sciences. “During that time I was pretty lucky,” Yoshiura said. “I had a prac with the Queensland Reds and that is how I started my career in S and C in rugby.”
The national game that had inspired him as a kid began to take a back seat as Yoshiura started to ponder his post-playing career. “I was still enjoying playing footy, but it just got to a crossroad where I had a few little niggles, an MCL injury and some foot issues and that started to impact on the work I was doing at the Reds,” he said. “It was time to decide what I wanted to do long-term and that led me to focus more on the rugby side of things.”
Yoshiura stayed on with the Reds for several years, eventually completing a Master of Science by Research at Bond, focusing on immunosuppression in elite rugby athletes. “I wanted to explore if we could predict illness so we could modulate or mediate training loads or flag to the coaches that some of the players are going to be at a higher risk of illness,” he said. “Super Rugby at that point was quite demanding, there was travel to South Africa and back-to-back games and it was interesting because if you do carefully plan and periodise your season, in terms of loading, there wasn’t that much suppression. It was a credit to how Marshy designed the programs and planned it that led to what was quite insightful research for me.”
Then in 2017 Yoshiura joined the Wallaroos for the World Cup in Ireland, igniting a deep connection with women’s rugby.
A return to his roots
What followed was six transformative years in Japan with Suntory Sungoliath, one of the nation's top rugby clubs. “After the World Cup I wanted to step out of my comfort zone and that became a really special time,” he said. “I worked my way up from Assistant S and C Coach to Head of Athletic Performance, learning from some of the best guys, not just the coaches but also some of the players such as Beauden Barrett, Damian McKenzie, Sean McMahon, and Matt Giteau.”
But when the time came to return home with his partner, he found himself drawn not to Super Rugby, but to the Wallaroos. “I had really fond memories of my time working with the Wallaroos and to see the growth in the game and the opportunities that evolved off the back of that World Cup while I had been away really sparked my interest,” he said.
A changed landscape in women's sport
While he had been abroad there had been an explosion in women’s football in Australia.
The AFL had introduced a national women’s competition and the rush of female athletes crossing over from other sports for the chance at a semi-professional career had forced the NRL and Rugby Australia to also begin investing more in female talent and pathways. A new era had begun.
“There has been a big shift,” Yoshiura said of the high-performance environment he discovered on his return. “It is chalk and cheese from where they were in 2016 and 17, which is exciting. The girls know some of the key fundamentals of being a professional, in terms of recovery, things like nutrition, and how they balance their work and sporting career.
"They are just so intuitive, they're so hungry to learn and want to be better. Now it is, how do we take that to the next level? That is where I am trying to lead it.”
Yoshiura is now pouring his expertise and experience into giving the Wallaroos the best possible chance of advancing through a tough group that includes favourites England at the World Cup.
But he also has a longer-term ambition – to grow the game of women’s rugby.
A new lease of life
His resume could have taken him anywhere but Yoshiura wanted his next step to be more about someone else’s journey. He found that his return to the Wallaroos reignited his passion for S and C coaching.
“I saw it as an opportunity to give back to the sport that allowed me to experience so many incredible things around the world,” he said. “It is quite rewarding. I’m here to try and help grow the women's game because there's just so many exciting girls that want to become professional and take it to the next level. I’m really motivated to try to provide more opportunities for these athletes to showcase to the country what they've got.”
His next professional goal? Leading S and C innovation in women’s rugby – possibly through doctoral research at Bond.
“I’m not there yet,” he joked. “But I do think about it and if I was going to do a PhD, it would be a no-brainer to do it in women’s rugby. There’s so much to explore around the physical development of young female athletes coming through club and school systems.”
From one game to a lifetime of impact
The AFL dream may have ended after just one game, but the lessons – and the belief sparked by that early conversation with Craig McRae – have stayed with Sean Yoshiura every step of the way.
“If these girls can believe in themselves, they’ll become better athletes,” he said. “That’s what I try to build into every program I run.”
Published on Thursday, 24 July, 2025.
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