Little did Baber know then that he would have to swap a pre-match pint in a Cardiff pub and a seat in the Principality Stadium stands for the Fijian coaching box.
It all represents a remarkable turnaround.
Welshman Baber was born and raised in Cardiff and was a star for the capital side during his playing days as a scrum-half, but there is also a special place in his heart for Fijian rugby.
Baber spent a season as joint head coach of Cardiff Rugby before taking charge of the Wales, Hong Kong and Fiji sevens teams.
He guided Fiji to an Olympic gold medal in sevens in Tokyo earlier this year and in doing so, immediately became a hero in the Pacific Island nation.
After that Olympic title, Baber was looking forward to some time off but then Fiji came calling again, only this time in the full 15-a-side format.
The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic and its resulting travel restrictions mean it is incredibly difficult to travel between the southern and northern hemispheres as things stand with long quarantine periods required.
Such a situation has hit Fiji hard and meant they were only able to pick players and coaches already in the north for their autumn tour.
It meant Vern Cotter, Fiji’s head coach, has been unable to travel to Europe and the same situation applies to many players. Baber answered the SOS to step in against the country of his birth.
He has coached against Wales on the World Sevens Series circuit but admits facing his homeland in a Test match in the city in which he grew up is a moment he will treasure.
“Funnily enough, I bought five tickets for this game about two months ago so I was always going to go and watch,” Baber said.
“We’ve still got the five tickets although there are only four of the family going now! They’ll all be in the crowd.
“Obviously, my association with the fifteens came relatively late so they will be there but there will be one seat empty and I will be somewhere else in the stadium watching.
“I’ve coached against Wales in the sevens and I always found that particularly strange.
“But now to be back in Wales and ultimately going to Principality Stadium to play fifteens rugby against Wales means you have to stop and get a degree of perspective on how your life moves and how lucky you are. I am very privileged to be coaching Fiji.
“We’ve got a fantastic group of players here who, in strange times, are working wonders to represent their people. Our staff of coaches and management got together less than two weeks ago and have bonded very quickly into quite a strong group.”
Baber lived in Fiji for four-and-a-half years so knows just how big rugby is to the country.
He insists there will be no divided loyalties for him as he goes up against a Wales side coached by Wayne Pivac, a man who previously worked with Fiji.
“It’s pretty special to be back in Cardiff and to be with a Fijian team that I obviously have a strong connection with. Fiji as a whole is a country that I have a strong connection with,” Baber said.
“We are in Cardiff and we are playing Wales, but ultimately my job is getting a performance this weekend and creating history with this group of players.
“Obviously I’m representing Fiji, but all of my thoughts are about beating the team I grew up loving and still love. That’s the nature of sport and this team that I love here in Fiji is the one that I’m representing.”
The Flying Fijians opened their November tour with a comfortable 43-13 victory over Spain last weekend, running in seven tries at the Estadio Nacional Complutense.
Hooker Sam Matavesi was a standout figure, but Baber admitted his team were a bit rusty and knows they will need to lift their intensity against the Six Nations champions.
Wales’ two opening autumn games have come against southern hemisphere giants New Zealand and South Africa and both have ended in defeat.
Yet Pivac would have been happy with his team’s improvement for the Springbok game as they pushed the current world champions and a team which beat the British & Irish Lions in their Test series this summer all the way. Next up for them is Baber’s Fiji.
“We got a bit sticky to begin with against Spain. We haven’t been together for long so it was good to get through some of that, but we know we’re going to have to be at another level against Wales,” Baber said.
“We did some good stuff against Spain, but we didn’t feel that we were clinical enough. “We weren’t intense enough in our physicality in the game and one thing I do know about Wales in the Principality Stadium is they will be physical and they will try and play a quick game.
“Before we can get to the style of rugby that we do love to play, we know that we have to do some hard work and we have to execute our plays with a degree of accuracy to allow us to do that.”
