Wallabies new coach: A foreigner won’t survive long enough to fix this mess
There’s one very good reason as to why the person appointed to fix Australia’s rugby union crisis must be an Australian – and it has nothing to do with talent – reveals ROBERT CRADDOCK.
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Australian rugby union cannot kid itself that a foreign coach is the best option to raise the sport from the bottom of the harbour.
Now, more than ever, you have to go local.
The new man is going to need a lot of people covering his back and history tells us foreign coaches have to survive without any modicum of sympathy or safety nets.
Ask former Wallaby coaches Robbie Deans and Dave Rennie (both from New Zealand) and South African-raised Australian cricket coach, Mickey Arthur.
Arthur and Rennie were sensationally hauled out of their jobs just as they were preparing for major assignments (the World Cup and the Ashes) in a way which surely would not have been as brutal had they been locals (even though Arthur settled in Perth).
But the men who axed them knew there would be precious little blow back. When you are a foreign coach in Australia you are a lone wolf. You don’t have old mates in the system looking after you. You don’t have people feeling sorry for you when you are gone.
Australians Dan McKellar and Stephen Larkham, with former All Black coach Ian Foster, are considered the frontrunners to take over from Jones in a job which may seem like a poisoned chalice but it has the alluring charm of taking on a team who are so low the only way to go is up.
The game has so many issues to address, the new man must cast his gaze beyond the Wallabies and that is another powerful reason to hire a local.
History tells us that foreign-raised coaches – quite understandably – have a laser focus on their Australia team and are not obsessed about nurturing the system around it.
Matildas coach Tony Gustavsson shamelessly put a wall around his team in the World Cup.
Dave Rennie was liked by his players and respected by everyone at Rugby Australia but there was no sense that he felt an overpowering drive to promote the product Australia-wide with any sort of missionary zeal. Understandable given he comes from a country where the game promotes itself.
That’s a worry in a sport that needs every fan it can get.
Getting a national coach who can reconnect the team to an Australian public which has fallen out of love with them is a major issue.
Do you seriously think a Kiwi coach is going to do that?
If New Zealand’s Foster took over the Wallabies could you seriously care whether he or his team succeeded or failed?
There seems to be a clash of opinions among rugby powerbrokers as to the best choice with chief executive Phil Waugh open to having an overseas coach but crisis stricken chairman Hamish McLennan favouring a local.
McLennan headed the dreadful decision to appoint “Unsteady Eddie” but this time appears on the right side of the argument. About time.
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Originally published as Wallabies new coach: A foreigner won’t survive long enough to fix this mess