Richard Cockerill, the Leicester director of rugby, has piled into the argument about the suitability of leading Premiership coaches for the senior England job, saying he has never received career-development advice from the Rugby Football Union and claiming “knee-jerk” decisions are taken when a senior coaching vacancy arises at Twickenham.
The RFU said this week that it would be reluctant to appoint a national head coach who has not worked abroad, prompting a strong reaction from several experienced Premiership figures. Cockerill also feels that those who achieve success in the intensely competitive world of English domestic rugby should not be seen as inferior operators. “I joined Leicester [as an academy coach] back in 2004 and I’ve had no help whatsoever from the RFU in terms of career development or coaching development,” Cockerill said. “I’ve just worked it out with my other coaches and players and found my own way to this point.
“I think there are quality coaches in the Premiership but it’s about how you help them. I don’t know if I can coach at Test level because I’ve never done it. But there is nobody within the RFU who is helping with that knowledge. Nobody from the union has spoken to me about it, ever. Nobody from the union – as far as I know – has every asked any of the coaches in the Premiership: ‘If an opportunity came in three years’ time, would you like to be part of the England set-up?’ Those conversations don’t happen. They just have a knee-jerk reaction when someone gets the sack, don’t they? Generally, that’s true.”
Cockerill, as it happens, has enjoyed a stint abroad with Clermont Auvergne but he is not convinced a southern hemisphere sojourn should be compulsory for aspiring coaches. “A lot of that stuff gets done by luck rather than judgment,” he said. “Do I have to go to Clermont or Toulouse or go and coach the Sunwolves to prove I can coach? I can understand the [RFU’s] preference is to have international experience but what exactly is international experience of coaching? [Sale’s] Steve Diamond should probably get it then because he’s coached Russia.”
Cockerill has no objection to the RFU appointing an Australian in Eddie Jones as national coach but he does wonder aloud if the RFU chief executive Ian Ritchie’s desire for an eventual successor to have overseas experience is entirely logical. “Ian Ritchie seems to have the question but he doesn’t seem to know the answer. He’s the chief exec of the union. Maybe he should have the answers,” Cockerill said.
“I don’t know what the RFU are doing to develop young English coaches, to take that next step. The impression I’ve been given is that, if you are an under-16, -18 or -20s coach at the RFU, from that group they will find the next person who will go through and coach England. But, generally, those are guys who have been sacked from the Premiership.
“If it is purely results-based around the Premiership I have won the competition three times, so does that make me the right man to coach England? It might not. It depends what they want. Rob Baxter has done a great job coaching Exeter but does that mean he is the right man? We won’t know until he steps up into that role. The Premiership is so intense there’s not much time – apart from the odd summer tour – to take a Premiership coach and give them international experience. But what is international experience? I am dealing with international players all the time. We are all coaching international players.”
Northampton and Exeter will welcome back their respective England internationals Calum Clark and Jack Nowell when the two clubs meet in the Premiership at Franklin’s Garden on Friday evening. Saracens’s England lock George Kruis is also fit enough to return to his side’s second-row against Bristol at Ashton Gate.