Murphy: Young coaches have Tigers daring to dream
LEICESTER legend Geordan Murphy reckons the energy being created by their youthful coaching team can fire the Tigers right back to the top.
While experienced Aussie Matt O’Connor, 46, now conducts the show, Murphy and fellow coaches Boris Stankovich (36), Richard Blaze (32), Brett Deacon (35) and academy head honcho Anthony Allen (30) have an average age of under 35.
Long-serving Murphy, now in his fifth season coaching, told TRP: “Matt’s steering the ship and has done a good job, but it’s actually quite refreshing having a young team of coaches who’ve been around Tigers for a while.
“We bounce off each other and everyone’s quite receptive to hearing criticism. We might be pretty young but we’ve got a lot of experience between us from playing Premiership and international rugby over many years.
“It’s exciting to be in at the start of something new under Matt, who’s coached all over the world and been successful. It’s been a hell of a learning experience since I retired in 2013 but we’re determined to make this work.”
Murphy’s job as attack coach will ease considerably if Manu Tuilagi and Matt Toomua make the starting gate alongside star signing George Ford.
The early signs are good says Murphy: “Both Manu and Matt are out on the training field – running, passing, catching and kicking – so it’s been a great pre-season from that point of view so far.
“One of the biggest differences from pre-season last year is that the majority of our bodies are fit and firing. We don’t have many people lying on physio beds so we’re pretty much at full strength. Manu’s been so unlucky with injuries but if he can finally get a run of games we’ll see his rugby go to the next level.
“It’s almost like signing a new player and with him and Toomua competing for places, we’ll be able to field some excellent combinations.”
Just making a 14th successive appearances in the play-offs will not be good enough for Murphy: “A semi-final and a one-point loss to Wasps was really disappointing for the players. We have to go one better.”