RICHIE MCCAW HAS backed Ronan O’Gara to succeed in New Zealand, and believes that his northern hemisphere influence will add a welcome new dimension to the Crusaders’ Super Rugby challenge next season.
It was confirmed yesterday morning that O’Gara will depart Racing 92 to take up a coaching role with the reigning Super Rugby champions.
The former Ireland out-half will begin his new role in New Zealand in the New Year, officially picking up the reins as backs coach on 1 January 2018.
It’s a move that’s seen as the next step on the coaching ladder for 40-year-old O’Gara, and All Blacks great McCaw is first to agree.
Ideally versed to share his thoughts after spending 14 years at the Christchurch outfit and knowing New Zealand rugby inside out, McCaw is eager to see what O’Gara can bring to his new role.
“It’s quite exciting,” he said.
“It’s exciting from a Crusaders point of view to have the first sort of northern hemisphere influence on the Crusaders. I’m thinking that the time Ronan had at Racing around guys like Dan Carter and Casey Laulala, O’Gara, he knew that it was the right place to go.
“The Crusaders boys would ask the same questions. There’s no doubt that he’s got a pretty good rugby brain and he’ll bring some new ideas and stuff that the Crusaders that will be pretty keen to hear.”
The culture and environment is a special one, McCaw says, and he backs O’Gara to thrive there.
“I think the Crusaders traditionally would be the most successful franchise in Super Rugby,” he continues. “I think the culture and what the team stands for has been pretty well set up right from day one, led by guys like Wayne Smith and Todd Blackladder.
“It’s got a great culture. They’ve just come off winning the last Super Rugby. It’s a pretty successful franchise which I think do things pretty damn well. It’s always the team comes first before the individual, that’s the ethos of the team so he’ll be coming into that.
“The guys are always trying to be better and succeed, and they’ll pick Ronan’s brain for experiences and ideas. I think it’ll be great.”
“It’s something that’s slightly unique. I think knowing the guys that he’ll be coaching and the way that the Crusaders’ set-up is, they’ll embrace (it).
“I’m sure he’ll have some different ways of looking at things, he’ll probably take a while to get up to speed with the Crusaders’ work and their way of doing things.
“It’s not as if he’s coming in as head coach, (Scott) Robertson’s there and you’ve obviously got his philosophy on how the team goes and they’ll want to build on what they did last year, but having O’Gara there is something different. I think it’s a pretty good move.”
McCaw himself is keeping busy and enjoying his retirement since he hung up his boots in 2015. His main role, he says, is a commercial helicopter pilot with Christchurch Helicopters.
“Really enjoying the challenge that comes with that,” he smiles, and adds that he’s really gotten into adventure racing so there’s plenty of training involved with that too.
“I thought I’d have a lot more time on my hands when I finished playing, I’ve got less! But I’m doing things I really enjoy as well.”
When he stepped away from the game, McCaw said that he wanted to take a complete break from rugby and had no immediate plans to venture into coaching.
And last night, his thoughts remained the same.
“To be honest, no I don’t,” he said, when asked if he had any plans to move into that side of rugby.
“I haven’t really got that desire to go and coach. Secondly, I haven’t got time to think like that.
“I think what would have happened if I didn’t have something like the helicopters to get my teeth into and had a bit of time on my hands, that’s when you’d maybe start thinking ‘Perhaps I could go coaching’ or that could be an option.
“But at the moment I’m really happy doing what I’m doing. I just don’t have time. To be honest, I’m enjoying just watching rugby from afar, on the TV, from the stand, I’m getting my enjoyment out of rugby from that.”
AIG Ambassador Richie McCaw is helping promote AIG Ireland’s Bring on Tomorrow campaign, a series of initiatives around risk prevention, road safety and customer education. For more information, please visit www.aig.ie
The42 has just published its first book, Behind The Lines, a collection of some of the year’s best sports stories. Pick up your copy in Eason’s, or order it here today (€10):
Sounds worrying
@geraldo: he has a point about thr penalty count. When your winning handy enough there’s no excuse to give away penalties.
Hard to stay disciplined and motivated if you are winning by 50pts. The big problem is the overlap with international windows. It effectively means each club has to have two teams. If there were fewer games it would be more competitive. A pool or conference system is the only way to go without asking unions to reduce the number of teams they have.
@Rudiger McMonihan: few clubs lose a whole team to the international windows. Maybe one in each country would lose 15. I think a 2 division league might work but as soon as the SA teams come in it would be them and the 3 Irish sides. So maybe not.
@Chris Mc: I think this year you need to include all four provinces. If Connacht had played all their games they would be second in conference B.
@Chris Mc: no union will ever have relagation, would the FIR, WRU or IRFU risk one or more of their professional teams being 2nd division teams? Glasgow, Edinburgh, Zebre, Benetton lose as many players as Leinster to international call ups and have nowhere near the same resources. Its little surprise Leinster are walking it against those teams.
@Rudiger McMonihan: think we touched on this before, clubs need the 10/11 home games. The proposed new rugby calendar if it gets agreed will sort it out. With no overlap durning internationals. It has a 29/30 week club season, but I think it would be the end of the HCup. As the French Top 14 takes 29 weeks and if given the choice between changing their league system or leaving the HCup the French would leave the HCup. The Pro 16 and English Prem would have maybe 5 weeks that they could fit a new European rugby cup in (Current HCup, takes 9 weeks), but no way can the French fit in a 29 round league and 9 round HCup in 30 weeks, and if there are no French is it really worth it?
@Kingshu: yeah I said they need to reduce the number of club games. Pre-covid Super rugby teams played far fewer games (16 + 3 knock outs). The best players go on to play internationals after (14 in a normal year). Then the rest play in the mitre cup (10 + 2 KO’s). So everyone gets game time, the calendar is more coherent and the games are more competitive. The way our calendar is set up is ridiculous. There is so much overlap between pro14, Heineken cup and internationals. We bounce between the 3 all year too. Teams dont get enough time together to build momentum and their position on the table is often down to how well their 3rd or 4th choice player is.
@Rudiger McMonihan: The New global calendar proposal
Is
Autumn internationals: October-November
Club and European games: December-July with a 7 week break for
Six Nations: April-May and same time the Rugby Championship: April-May. Players get a break from end of July to start of Oct.
Thats a 30 week club season with 7 week break with no games played durning 6 nations/rugbt championship. I just can’t see the Top 14 fitting their league and Hcup into that window.
@Con Cussed: have they not lost 2 games so far. They are a bit off the top 3 to be fair.
@Kingshu: I am with you on this. The system that has been cobbled together over the years has suited the Irish set-up more than anyone else; its deficiencies are increasingly obvious but it is hard to see that there will be changes that will be beneficial in the round.
The underlying problem is that there are only 2 countries – England and France – with the resources to support a domestic professional ‘club’ set-up. The rest have to rely on subsidies from the mens’ senior international game and an artificial cobbled-together league combining the remaining countries.
For us the real focus of the ‘club’ game is the Heineken Cup, but this can only really exist if the English and French clubs want it to, and only a minority of them are really committed