The change at the top has rejuvenated Edinburgh
Edinburgh’s Grant Gilchrist has revealed feedback from the players had a role in the departure of Richard Cockerill, whose four-year reign as head coach ended abruptly last month.
The 31-year-old international forward insisted that he and his team-mates had not called directly for Cockerill to be ousted, and said that the Englishman – who officially left his post “by mutual consent” – had made a lot of progress during his time at the helm.
But he admitted that the players had highlighted things that had gone wrong, and said they felt “rejuvenated” under new head coach Mike Blair.
“We’re involved in a feedback process at the end of the season,” Gilchrist said.
“We didn’t know what was going to be done with that, and we didn’t want to delve into things that are not our job.
“But it was clear from the review process that we needed to change a few things, having under-performed. The union had their own review, and we are where we are with a new coach.”
Edinburgh undoubtedly became tougher to beat under Cockerill, but there was growing unrest last season about his inflexible approach.
Even so, Gilchrist believes it is important for the team to stick with the improvements he made and not just forget about them because he has gone.
“We’re talking about the foundations that have been set by Cocker in his time at the club and we obviously want to evolve from that strong foundation,” he continued.
“We’ve had success – last year highlighted that we need to evolve, whether that was with Cocker or without Cocker. It’s turned out that it’s without.
“I think overall we’re in a good place now and I want to talk about the future of Edinburgh. We weren’t able to evolve the culture and the game plan to a place where we could kick on.
“That’s where Mike has come in, and we’re really excited by someone who understands the value in what’s been done over the last four years – but also the things that have to be better.
“After four years of one style it feels fresh and feels new, and that can be exciting.
“I think that has rejuvenated the playing group, specially some guys who were maybe feeling worse than others. Sometimes that fresh approach is needed and can breathe a new lease of life into guys.”
Meanwhile, Glasgow fullback Cole Forbes hopes to be back playing rugby this week after a frustrating summer that saw his hopes of a first Scotland cap dashed by Covid concerns. The 22-year-old was called up to the national squad only for the games against England ‘A’, Georgia and Romania, to be called off.
Forbes knows it will be tough to get back into the national set-up this autumn now all the senior players will be available, so is concentrating on finding his best form with the Warriors – starting on Friday, when they are at home to Newcastle Falcons in their first pre-season friendly.
“After being involved in the summer camp I want to be involved in the autumn,” he said.
“But knowing there’s the likes of Stuart Hogg and Duhan van der Merwe coming back from the Lions makes it a lot tougher.
“So I’m only worried about playing well for Glasgow just now, and if other stuff comes it comes. But I’m not really fussed about that at the moment.”