Warren Gatland leads Wales into a vital World Cup year, which begins in earnest against England in Cardiff on February 6 © Getty Images

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"I like winning. I don't believe in the bull of playing well and losing, I'd rather play like crap and win a game any day of the week."

Even as a five-year-old, Warren Gatland just wanted to win. Every night before he played for Eastern Suburbs, he wore his rugby shirt to bed. Just before he drifted off into dreams of winning the following day, he'd fold up his kit and put it on the end of his bed.

In his school years, Gatland's lunch hour would be spent with a rugby ball in hand or playing ball rush, a version of British bulldog; the summer would be cricket's turn. The afternoon, more often than not, would be spent sat in the classroom caked in mud. He'd be barefooted; wearing shoes to school only occurred from the age of 12. Any matches, casual or more competitive, were only worthwhile in his eyes if the score was kept.

Gatland: Through the years

Gatland helped Lawrence Dallaglio and Wasps to the 2005 Premiership crown © Getty Images

• Galwegians (1989-94) and Connacht (1996-98): "I went there as a player-coach when I was 25 with Galwegians and then got the opportunity with Connacht, it was a case of being in the right place at the right time."
• Ireland (1998-2001): "I was 34 when I got that job. In 1998, Brian Ashton resigned and they asked me to do the rest of the Five Nations and the next four years. I'm very proud of the fact that I instigated a lot of players coming back from England and Europe back to Ireland. We put some structures in place and it was the base of a lot of success the national team enjoyed."
• Wasps (2002-05): "I loved my time in London with Wasps. I looked at that team and saw them towards the foot of the Premiership and the big draw card for me was the chance to live in London. I had some great friends who lived there. It was hard to leave there. The year before we won the Heineken Cup in 2004, we were a better side and we would have won it had we been in the competition in 2003."
• Waikato (2005-07): "I had three years in Waikato and we won the ANZ Cup there and we had a good side. It is great to see Mils Muliaina do well and I have a lot of time for Beaver [Stephen Donald]. He got so much stick in New Zealand and if you meet him you couldn't get a more genuine bloke. People had judgmental opinions about him and it's the same with me."
• Wales (2007-): We are lucky as we have some outstanding coaches Rob Howley, Neil Jenkins and Rob McBryde has turned into an outstanding forwards coach and we know the attributes of Shaun Edwards, who is outstanding. We have an exceptional manager in Alan Phillips. We have a group of people where we get on well together, we have some fun and we aren't afraid to disagree or dispute. It's healthy."

"If they were out in the playground playing as a class and if we were playing rugby or football and the teacher was playing so there was no score, I had no interest," Gatland told ESPN as the fire flickered and the snow fell outside the cafe at the Vale. "It didn't drive me, I turned off. It took me a long time to realise that about myself, that's what drove me. It is competition and being successful."

Years on and as we sit after Gatland named his eighth Six Nations squad as Wales coach, the desire to win remains intrinsic to his DNA. "I'm still driven now. If we lose a game I don't sleep very well that night or the next night. I take it to heart. I expect players to be like that.

"I struggle when watching Super Rugby on television and when the final whistle goes, the players are high-fiving each other and enjoying it. I can understand the camaraderie and I expect the players to hurt as much as we do."

Gatland's experience of Super Rugby has to date been limited to one season as a technical advisor for his hometown franchise the Chiefs. It has been the northern hemisphere where the old PE teacher has grown his reputation as one of the sport's finest brains. New Zealand is now reserved for rest and recuperation, whether it be in his house just outside Hamilton or on the beach in Waihi.

Switching off is not easy for Gatland. He is a voracious watcher of sport and watched Sprinter Sacre's return with interest. Then there is the cricket as he keeps an eye on the Black Caps' progress from afar. He also took in the NFL play-offs though the Green Bay Packers' capitulation against the Seahawks was a little too familiar for him having seen his side throw victory into the jaws of defeat on occasion. They buckled under pressure - a word which became a theme of the autumn Tests. Some former players came out of the woodwork preaching it was time for Gatland to move on, individuals he labels "rent-a-quotes". It provoked a furious riposte from Gatland's defence coach Shaun Edwards.

"It's just part of the job," Gatland said. "I've got quite a good handle on it. I don't always think the media reflect public opinion and I think I'm a reasonable judge of that. There's no bullshit with me, I just tell it straight. I think the public get that and understand and respect it. They are almost like the silent majority while there are the minority who kick off. It was the same in Ireland.

"People tell me I'm under pressure, but who created it? It wasn't created by me. Was it someone in the media? It's my biggest challenge at the moment. I pride myself on being honest and straight up, if I'm asked for my opinion, I'll give them an opinion. It doesn't matter if it's right or wrong. Those are the sort of ideals I've lived by.

"I have no problem with people being critical of me, or people disagreeing with me, as with selection it's a matter of opinion. I like to think at times I admit I made a mistake and you expect other people to do that."

The most controversial selection call of Gatland's coaching career was the Brian O'Driscoll case in the third Test of the 2013 British & Irish Lions tour. Gatland was widely pilloried pre-match for his decision to drop the veteran. The 41-16 thrashing his Lions handed out to the Wallabies was validation. When he took his seat in the post-match press conference he referred to reaction to the selection as "vitriolic". Even now, 18 months on, the memories provoke frustration.

"I was blown away by that. It is a pressure job and that's what I was paid to do, perhaps that was their take on it. I understand that but after a 40-point result they probably think they have put two-dozen eggs in one basket and it's tough to retract from that. There are others who still can't acknowledge that. That's part of the learning process."

As any coach knows, winning makes the job a lot easier and in a World Cup year, the spotlight glares ever brighter on decisions, dropped balls and results. The Six Nations will give him a chance to weigh up various candidates for the 31-man squad he will have to pick ahead of their opener against Uruguay on September 20. But in that is the beauty of the beast when it comes to the World Cup years. The Six Nations coaches have to compartmentalise their year.

The autumn Tests saw Gatland and his lieutenants try a new approach. The bags containing the training rugby balls were largely kept in a dark corner. Instead the players were put through rigorous fitness work. At 6.30 in the morning in the weeks leading up to their opener against Australia the players were in the gym: it was pre-season-esque. Rugby was forsaken for fitness.

After the defeat to the Wallabies and the unconvincing win over Fiji, the rugby balls came out again. "We flipped it over for the last two weeks; for New Zealand and South Africa, we did a lot of rugby," Gatland said. "Against the All Blacks we were winning after 69 minutes and in the past they beat us by playing rugby. But we coped with that and I remember thinking 'we've never been in this situation before'.

Gatland's Gameplan

Gatland shows off the trophies Wales claimed during their 2012 Grand Slam © Getty Images

• "We have a game blueprint the players understand that when things get messy we are able to get into shape and organisation. What we've been trying to encourage the players to do is play more of what is in front of them with decision making and offloading and variation.
• "The big thing from the autumn is the kicking game. As teams have got better defensively and more organised there is limited space on the field. Kicking strategy is a really important part of the game. That's the next stage for us.
• "Defensively for us we are good in the air. If you look at the Premiership at the moment, those who are kicking most are winning most of the games and that's the difference between attack and defence. That brings more kicking as teams are reluctant to play in their own half and that's where we are with ourselves."

"They started the kicking strategy which became successful and there was the bounce of the ball from a kick [Beauden Barrett's score two minutes after Wales took the lead] and the charge-down [Kieran Read's try three minutes later] and we came away from that with a massive amount of confidence.

"Then we played South Africa and we could have won by another 15 to 20 points. There were a lot of positives from the autumn in terms of doing something different and we assessed it. There were the pros and cons and the Six Nations is different. Some things are a little bit similar. We are doing things in the long-term but the Six Nations is the tournament we prepare for now and want to win. Then the planning and preparation for the World Cup kicks in."

There is no autocracy with Gatland when it comes to planning and preparation. If a coach or player is not challenging a decision, he wonders why. Some need an arm around them and others need "a good boot up the backside". "You try and create a winning ethos through that. A big part of us in the Wales set-up is we have tried to get the players to be confident about having an input. We have a group of people where we get on well together, we have some fun and we aren't afraid to disagree or dispute. It's healthy. You create a situation where there is no issue with challenging. The end result is that when we make a decision it's one that we've all been involved in."

Gatland acknowledges that the 2019 World Cup will likely be the end point for a few of Wales' more notable internationals but for the here and now, the focus returns to the Vale and the Six Nations. Gatland will preside over a 34-man squad for the forthcoming championship. It is a competition that has proved to be a happy hunting ground for him. The Grand Slams of 2008 and 2012 dovetail with their success in 2013. But for him the memory of a certain try in 2009 was the perfect incarnation of his coaching philosophy.

It came at Murrayfield. Shane Williams found himself on the right wing, an uncertain position, but he managed to offload to Leigh Halfpenny who scored in the corner to make it 21-3 to Wales. "It was a special moment," Gatland smiles as he recalls it but more important on that day was their victory.

Such moments are a perfect manifestation of the work he puts in to ensure success both in the short and long-term. But that hard work will mean nothing unless Wales are on the right side of the scoreboard. It's the lifeblood of the man. "There's nothing in between when it comes to rugby, it's agony or ecstasy."