formerflanker
Ken Catchpole (46)
My mistake. Wednesday before the pool game.
My mistake. Wednesday before the pool game.
Double Agent
Allen Oxlade (6)
Is Morgan Turinui the only functioning adult in senior Australian Rigby circles? '...Turinui was forced to step in when no one else was willing to do so...'. Surely there would have been other Board Members or very senior rugby officials present and yet it fell to him to do something. I assume he was just there as an invited guess and member of Classic Wallabies - happy to be corrected if he has some official RA position.
dru
Tim Horan (67)
Grace from the big man. All the best Michael.
B
Bobby Sands
Guest
Cameron Clyne stood himself down... where is this discussion taking place
Derpus
George Gregan (70)
Good to see Cheika applies his exemplary level of composure to other facets of his life.
All aside I still think Cheika is quite a good coach and is likely to be fairly successful with Montpellier should he go there. Not his fault we kept a motivation focused coach on for a five year tenure.
Be hard to get motivated by the same speech 75 iterations in.
Lorenzo
Colin Windon (37)
Isn't this is bit rough on Castle?
Given this bit here?
But tensions boiled over towards the end of the function when Castle approached Cheika to thank him for turning up and bringing the players under the circumstances. Cheika took umbrage and the interaction escalated into a loud argument, with the coach unloading on Castle about her actions.
Asking 4 wallabies - 1st XV guys, even, frankly - to show up to an event like this 4 days out is perfectly reasonable. It's not like they were obligated to crush nose-beers in the disabled loo. They would have been playing xbox or perusing instagram for girls otherwise anyway. They certainly wouldn't have been studying opposition film or practicing their kicking, that much we do know
Then old m8 - at least according to the article - decides to get stuck in at the function simply further confirms that he is the man-child we already knew he was. How this reflects poorly on the CEO you will have to explain to us.
formerflanker
Ken Catchpole (46)
Given we don't know all of the details, a cynical old guy could easily be forgiven in thinking that Cheika reacted to Castle's gloating.
She wanted players there, he refused, she goes over his head without informing him, gets Johnson's OK but he doesn't tell Cheika - I think Cheika had the right to be cranky when she "thanks" him for being there.
No right to air it publicly, and she had no right to respond in the same vein.
Lorenzo
Colin Windon (37)
But..you have created the bit about the 'gloating' and the thanks that isn't actually a thanks. That isn't in the article.
Do you agree that the original request was reasonable and that MC could have just given his approval at the outset?
Only one of these two has a long history of acting like a little bitch in public.
Do you agree that the original request was reasonable and that MC could have just given his approval at the outset?
Only one of these two has a long history of acting like a little bitch in public.
B
Bobby Sands
Guest
Cheika consistently acts like a child.
He has a massive chip on his shoulder from when he played and then when he was starting coaching. He was never part of the sanctum.
Then he came home the prodigal son.
Unfortunately he still carries himself like an angry teenager.
The end.
He has a massive chip on his shoulder from when he played and then when he was starting coaching. He was never part of the sanctum.
Then he came home the prodigal son.
Unfortunately he still carries himself like an angry teenager.
The end.
TSR
Mark Ella (57)
What is clearly in the article is that she asked, and when she didn’t get the answer she wanted she circumvented him.
That’s very poor on her behalf. At that level, if she didn’t accept the response she should have gone to him directly.
I am no Cheika apologist - nor necessarily an arch critic of Castle - but he had every right to be pissed.
It was obvious when Link left that Cheika was the only person for the job. He did an outstanding job getting the team to the RWC final. In the years since his weaknesses as a coach have been revealed but he still had a lot of credit in the bank from winning the Super Rugby with the Tah's and the RWC. If you're going to replace a Head Coach it needs to be done at least 2 years out from the tournament and you need someone available who can take their spot. I don't recall anyone who was available at that time, plus we'd just beaten the All Blacks in Brisbane and things were looking up. And maybe that will be his legacy, when things looked dyer the team always managed a performance that gave us all hope.
His strength was getting the players to follow him. He just needed the players to buy in, some of the ones we could have used obviously didn't so left or were left out (Fardy and Cooper might fall into this camp). Listen to James Haskell on House of Rugby and he explains it quite well. The issue is when he didn't have the right direction for the team and they just followed him, like this world cup.
Also, he has an old school attitude that put a few offside. All the talk about not looking at the opposition is crazy in this day and age. I get focusing on what you want to do, but you need to take advantage of the weaknesses of the opposition. He was always circling the wagons too.
I wish him well in the future. He'll get picked up somewhere, some talk about USA or a club in France.
In regards to Castle I think she has done a good job so far. How she manages the recruitment process of the new coach and deals with future issues will be the making of her as a CEO.
His strength was getting the players to follow him. He just needed the players to buy in, some of the ones we could have used obviously didn't so left or were left out (Fardy and Cooper might fall into this camp). Listen to James Haskell on House of Rugby and he explains it quite well. The issue is when he didn't have the right direction for the team and they just followed him, like this world cup.
Also, he has an old school attitude that put a few offside. All the talk about not looking at the opposition is crazy in this day and age. I get focusing on what you want to do, but you need to take advantage of the weaknesses of the opposition. He was always circling the wagons too.
I wish him well in the future. He'll get picked up somewhere, some talk about USA or a club in France.
In regards to Castle I think she has done a good job so far. How she manages the recruitment process of the new coach and deals with future issues will be the making of her as a CEO.
Lorenzo
Colin Windon (37)
What the article says is that wallabies had already committed to sending the entire squad. It was Castle that offered the compromise of 4 players.
It sounds like she DID go to him directly.
"Castle had offered a compromise that the team send four players and some other Australian rugby dignitaries."
MC was unreasonable about it:
"Cheika continued to push back, unwilling to send any players, a scenario that would have been a major embarrassment for RA"
So she dealt with the problem herself which, as CEO, she is rather entitled to do.
Of course, we know Cheika's resistance was totally logical because he ended up changing his mind.
Honestly, if your boss / the CEO asks you for something and you say no, ought you be surprised when they get it from someone else?
Isn't Cheika supposed to be a really thick-skinned no-bullshit not-a-drama-queen kinda guy? If so, should he have gotten so terribly wounded from learning that the guys he was gonna send to a function had already been told they were going?
RedsHappy
Tony Shaw (54)
It is absolutely normal and the typical case that a national, uppermost level, Australian representative sporting team is invited to and is expected to come to a very nicely done welcome-type function at the Australian Embassy of the applicable comp-hosting city. Happens with the Australian cricket team in London for the Ashes, whole team turns up. Plus many dignitaries and distinguished guests from the local country. These events are planned and dates known long in advance by all invitees.
it would thus be considered an extreme and highly embarrassing discourtesy for our national team to simply not turn up to such a function in Japan hosted by our national Embassy. And Australia<>Japan relations are in our country's top order. IIRC the Australian Govt also makes $ grants to RA in some form, there is also that aspect to it all.
If this story of MC's refusal for he and the team to attend such a mid-week high-profile Embassy function is true, incontestably it's a shocking indictment of his character, cultural sensitivity (good etiquette is of great importance in Japan) and judgement (why provoke a fight with and gross embarrassment for your employers in a highly exposed, high profile setting all in the middle of a major competition where calm and constructive ongoing relations are important?).
But what it is not is surprising.
Slim 293
Stirling Mortlock (74)
Not any more
Ok so I've done a nice pretty graph. I'm no statistician but I think it tells a story.
Interestingly Ben Darwin has been of the belief that there has been a consistent downward spiral in terms of Wallaby performance and that it didn't matter who was coaching, the results were likely as the system is broke (something I can't quite get around).
Anyway, I've broken down Wallaby team win percentages into 5 year increments. Now there is some fiddling with this in the early years as, for instance, between 1899 and 1903 we only played 5 tests. And then none following 1914 until 1920, and again none from 1938 to 1946. But you get the idea.
The Wallaby overall win %age is just a smidge over 50% from my records (including games played by the Waratahs early last century, matches that were later deemed to be capped matches).
From my perspective Australian Rugby can be split two phases - pre 1975 and post 1975. It's actually more specifically around 1978 as a turning point, but as a 5 year increment it's 1976-1980. We were not a good team before this. We had a win record of just under 30%.
From that 1975 period onwards, the record in just over 60%. Now obviously we had a particularly successful decade in the 90s when our win record was a little over 75%, but the trend upwards started in the late 70s. The upturn came as a result of a few endeavors, by all reports, including more the appointment of Dick Marks as a national coaching director, QLD undertaking regular tours of NZL, the advent of the AIS (after the debacle of the 1978 Olympics),and the emergence of that brilliant 1978 Australian Schoolboys team. There are more, I am sure, but these are common reasons provided.
But back to the graph. It shows win percentage by 5 year increment. The red solid line shows the overall Wallaby success rate, the green dashed line shows the success rate until 1975 and the yellow dashed line shows it post 1975.
Darwin's theory (ha!) that we've seen a declining performance line seems inaccurate in this graph (acknowledging it may be using different information to show his theory). Regardless, if you agree that our success rate in the last 4 and half decades is about 60% (not bad for a country our size with the competition from other codes), then the win rate of the last four years of less than 45% stands out as a massive under performance. In fact the win percentage over this period is the lowest it's been since that 1971-1975 period when we inherited the "woeful wallabies" tag.
Interestingly Ben Darwin has been of the belief that there has been a consistent downward spiral in terms of Wallaby performance and that it didn't matter who was coaching, the results were likely as the system is broke (something I can't quite get around).
Anyway, I've broken down Wallaby team win percentages into 5 year increments. Now there is some fiddling with this in the early years as, for instance, between 1899 and 1903 we only played 5 tests. And then none following 1914 until 1920, and again none from 1938 to 1946. But you get the idea.
The Wallaby overall win %age is just a smidge over 50% from my records (including games played by the Waratahs early last century, matches that were later deemed to be capped matches).
From my perspective Australian Rugby can be split two phases - pre 1975 and post 1975. It's actually more specifically around 1978 as a turning point, but as a 5 year increment it's 1976-1980. We were not a good team before this. We had a win record of just under 30%.
From that 1975 period onwards, the record in just over 60%. Now obviously we had a particularly successful decade in the 90s when our win record was a little over 75%, but the trend upwards started in the late 70s. The upturn came as a result of a few endeavors, by all reports, including more the appointment of Dick Marks as a national coaching director, QLD undertaking regular tours of NZL, the advent of the AIS (after the debacle of the 1978 Olympics),and the emergence of that brilliant 1978 Australian Schoolboys team. There are more, I am sure, but these are common reasons provided.
But back to the graph. It shows win percentage by 5 year increment. The red solid line shows the overall Wallaby success rate, the green dashed line shows the success rate until 1975 and the yellow dashed line shows it post 1975.
Darwin's theory (ha!) that we've seen a declining performance line seems inaccurate in this graph (acknowledging it may be using different information to show his theory). Regardless, if you agree that our success rate in the last 4 and half decades is about 60% (not bad for a country our size with the competition from other codes), then the win rate of the last four years of less than 45% stands out as a massive under performance. In fact the win percentage over this period is the lowest it's been since that 1971-1975 period when we inherited the "woeful wallabies" tag.
Lorenzo
Colin Windon (37)
The running rugby myth has a lot to answer for, as do those that relentlessly push it. My age constrains my analysis to the pro era, but I don't remember thinking that either Smith, Macqueen, Jones or Connolly (average 66% between them) were as bound by the idea that we aren't allowed to kick as the subsequent coaches have been. Connolly wasn't exactly known for playing Twinkle Toes McGee style footy yet we won 64 percent of our tests under him.
I wasn't around (well, not old enough to remember) but I've watched replays of the 1984 side and the 1991 side and I'm pretty sure they played sensible rugby, even if they had Campo or the Ellas or otherp players capable of entertaining with the ball.
I wasn't around (well, not old enough to remember) but I've watched replays of the 1984 side and the 1991 side and I'm pretty sure they played sensible rugby, even if they had Campo or the Ellas or otherp players capable of entertaining with the ball.