Leicester need revolution against board’s mediocrity
O’connor had to go – even after one game – but the Tigers’ many problems start at the top
Matt O’connor has gone – four months too late – but more heads need to roll if Leicester are to pull out of their tailspin into mediocrity. The 40-6 thrashing by Exeter last weekend was just the latest in a long line of recent humiliations, but Leicester’s problems go a lot deeper than bad results. They have lost their aura, they have lost their direction, they have lost their identity. Look at Saracens and Exeter. Even though they operate in completely different ways, everyone knows what they are about and what they stand for. You cannot say the same for Leicester.
On paper, you can argue they remain England’s biggest club. They had the biggest supporter base and the biggest trophy cabinet. That used to feed into their identity. We are the biggest, we are the meanest, we are the best. But then they were overtaken by clubs such as Saracens and none of those things apply any more. They have become a shell of their former selves.
They have accepted mediocrity in signings and performances. Every season there seems to be a big turnover of the squad and they are bringing in players that other clubs did not want. Leicester never previously signed a player that other clubs did not want. The top players only wanted to go elsewhere for significantly more money. You look at that Leicester teamsheet and there are two or three players who are close to being European class. The rest of them? Not yet. You look at the Saracens teamsheet and there are probably five or six guys who are potentially world class.
To the supporters it appears that the club just thought they were too big to fail. They became complacent and thought success just happens. It does not. To stay at the top, you need to be constantly evolving and planning ahead. Getting rid of O’connor after just one game shows that Leicester’s board are making it up as they go along. Reacting to stimulus rather than predicting and planning.
Make no mistake: O’connor had to go. Even before the game kicked off at Sandy Park, his body language was terrible. Normally after pre-season you come out bouncing on to the pitch. He sloped out like it was mid-april. As a head coach you have to exude energy.
But this decision should have been taken last season, when they missed out on the play-offs for the first time since 2004. If they had done this back in April, they could have approached Paul Gustard. If you had said to him, ‘Quins or Leicester?’ I am 100 per cent sure that as a former Tiger he would have chosen Leicester.
Where is the planning? Where is the process? And more importantly, where is the development of personnel?
I often hear people at Leicester say that hindsight is a wonderful thing, but that is only something you say when you have not planned properly and got something wrong. You never say, ‘In hindsight we shouldn’t be champions’.
Another thing I frequently hear around Leicester is that you cannot possibly say that, or you cannot shake the tree too hard. Screw that. Shake the tree as hard as you possibly can so all the c--falls out and anything strong stays behind. The club need a revolution, like Brendan Venter did with Saracens.
So what now? They need to be brave with Geordan Murphy in the short term because the last thing the club needs is more instability. But I would leave him to concentrate on coaching and trying to get the best out of Ben Youngs, George Ford and Manu Tuilagi, an axis that should be ripping up the league. Historically, Leicester’s best coaches have been in-house appointments – Dean Richards, Pat Howard, Richard Cockerill. Deano took charge with zero coaching experience and was woefully unprepared, but he was absolutely the right man for the job.
I would like to see someone come in to deal with all the firefighting in a general manager role, taking care of agents, shareholders and board members. Someone such as Leon Lloyd would be brilliant at that and then you are keeping it within Leicester. You bring him in and you say, ‘You are taking care of the business side of rugby for me and leave the coaching to Geordan’.
But even more importantly Leicester need a clear vision statement about where they are as a club. This needs to come from Geordan and the club now, so Leon or whoever can help put things in place for the long term. If that means accepting a couple of years of pain then we can take that on the chin. For the past five years or even longer, the club have been rudderless, at best average.
This current board only has a few decent rugby brains between them and some seem happy to just sit on their stock rather than being determined to make Leicester the best team in the land. If they are unable to provide that clear direction then they need to step aside. Many of them will not like this column … well boo hoo. Wake up and change or Welford Road may as well just be a multi-storey opposite the hospital.