RFU working to put more Englishmen in top jobs
NIGEL Melville, the RFU’s director of professional rugby, admits the number of overseas coaches occupying top jobs in England is a “concern”.
After Nick Kennedy’s disappointing resignation at London Irish saw the English head-honcho contingent in the top 13 clubs (including Bristol) slashed to four, Melville wants Premiership clubs to give home-grown candidates more chances.
Irishman Declan Kidney’s appointment at the Exiles, along with New Zealander Chris Boyd and South African coaching guru Alan Solomons taking top jobs at Northampton and Worcester respectively, leaves Rob Baxter (Exeter), John Kingston (Harlequins), Dean Richards (Newcastle) and Steve Diamond (Sale) as the last Englishmen standing.
Melville insists the RFU are not sitting idly by as director of rugby stocks are denuded, with Arsenal supremo Arsene Wenger among a number of sporting leaders enlisted to inspire the next generation of English coaches, along with other initiatives.
With Australian Eddie Jones occupying the England job, however, the chances of an English candidate succeeding him look remote. Asked about falling numbers, Melville told The
Rugby Paper: “It concerns
me. We don’t control who Premiership clubs sign up but we want to make sure the next generation are considered for these top roles.
“The way to do that is to make sure you’ve got an array of coaches below director of rugby level who are working in the Premiership and developing – then hopefully they will be given opportunities.
“When you look below, you’ve got young coaches like Dave Walder, Alex Sanderson, Alan Dickens and Ian Peel. Harvey Biljon in the Championship and Nick Walshe at Coventry are among other highly competent guys we know about.
“We have one-on-one discussions with the likes of Rory Teague, Joe Worsley, Alex King and Joe El Abd, who are all working in France, and by supporting these guys I think we can improve the numbers of English coaches in top jobs.
“Steve Borthwick’s, right, doing great work with England, along with Neal Hatley and Paul Gustard. You can only influence what you can influence but what we’re saying to the Premiership clubs is, ‘Look, here’s a good group of young coaches’.”
With English coaches occupying just six of the top 65 jobs world-wide – Richard Cockerill (Edinburgh) and Rory Teague (Bordeaux) are the others – Melville outlined the lengths to which the RFU are going in attempting to redress the balance.
He explained: “We’re building programmes for senior coaches which have already included events at the Belfry and in North London, where the FA’s Dan Ashworth and Arsene Wenger were among other leaders in sport we’ve involved.
“Some of our senior coaches have mentors from other sports and there’s our Under 20s programme where we’re giving experience to head coaches of the future like Anthony Allen, Louis Deacon, James Ponton, Ian Vass and Tom Williams.
“We’re taking guys to Six Nations coaching conferences and one of the things we’ve discussed with the Championship clubs is whether we could put an EQP system in place to encourage development there. A lot of things are going on.”