Cheque mate: Cheika’s pay bonus nightmare
Wallabies coach Michael Cheika looks glum for many reasons. His test success rate is dreadful. The All Blacks keep ridiculing him. When assistant coach Stephen Larkham was moved aside to another of the many departments at Rugby Australia’s monstrosity of a HQ at Moore Park, he made it clear he couldn’t cop Cheika.
Another reason for his gloom might be be that an inability to win the big trophies or achieve unbeaten tours has hit his wallet big time. It’s amazing what suddenly appears in the snout trough when the whisper gets around that the Ruck & Maul column is back.
Floating on top is a copy of Cheika’s original ‘‘employment agreement’’ with the then Australian Rugby Union in late October, 2014, to take over the Wallabies from Ewen McKenzie. The agreement provides intricate details of the coach’s ‘‘incentive arrangements’’.
First-up, the ARU increased its original Wallabies coaching offer by A$100,000 per annum at a time when Cheika was also coaching the Waratahs.
There was also an attractive ‘‘performance bonus’’ payments scheme – ‘‘a maximum of A$100,000 (NZ$104,000) for 2014, A$450,000 (NZ$467,000) for 2015 and A$400,000 (NZ$415,000) for 2016 and 2017’’. The employment agreement stressed that bonuses were not payable if Cheika was at any time suspended. The dangling carrot included A$100,000 to Cheika if Australia won any Bledisloe Cup series. That hasn’t happened. An unbeaten spring tour would also earn him A$100,000. No joy there, either.
A sum of A$100,000 was promised for Australia reaching the 2015 World Cup final. But if Australia had won the World Cup the bonus would have been a whopping A$250,000 (NZ$260,000). The All Blacks’ dominance again ensured Cheika’s big bickies went straight down the drain. As Steve Hansen would say . . . Mickey Mouse stuff.