Knuckles calls on Waratahs to appoint Hoiles to help fix Australian rugby – The Roar

John Connolly may be bleeding red, but the former Queensland and Wallabies coach says NSW’s performance is “killing Australian rugby” and the game’s veteran statesman has thrown his support behind emerging coach Stephen Hoiles to turn around the Waratahs turn.

After the Waratahs finished last in this year’s Super Rugby competition, NSW opted not to renew Darren Coleman’s three-year contract on the eve of this year’s finals series.

The decision by the NSW board, backed by Rugby Australia, was actually five months in the making after it was revealed in February that Coleman had the first five rounds to convince his bosses to earn a contract extension.

Several narrow defeats delayed the kingmaker’s decisions, but eventually the Waratahs’ horror year on the field caught up with Coleman and made the decision simple.

But the lengthy process over Coleman’s future has once again delayed the Waratahs’ ability to move forward and make plans, with the NSW board once again looking for their next coach.

All the while, rival franchises such as the Reds have been active on the recruitment front as they look to build on Les Kiss’ first campaign at Ballymore.

As Connolly said: “The NSW season starts now,” he said The roar. “What they do in the next six months could very well determine how next season goes.”

Connolly, who coached the Wallabies to the 2007 World Cup after a successful spell with the Reds in the 1990s, was scathing about the Waratahs’ decline since Michael Cheika’s successful reign that ended in 2015.

“They shook the deck chairs so many times,” Connolly said. ‘They sank the Titanic a few times.

“It kills the game.

“They have the largest player pool in Australia and they just haven’t performed outside of Cheika’s few years.

“A state as big as NSW, they’ve scattered the players’ first choice to finish bottom of the leaderboard!”

Connolly said the NSW board needed to ensure they got the next coach right to emerge as a heavyweight again.

The former Wallabies coach said he was impressed with Hoiles, who he took to the 2007 World Cup, and believed the second-year Randwick coach had something on him after ending the 20-year Shute Shield drought in 2023 Galloping Greens had broken through in his first season. season in the role.

“Hoiles should be strongly considered for the NSW job, really strongly considered,” Connolly said.

“He understands Test footy but he went back to club footy and won a premiership.

“NSW needs a broom, and a really big one. He could be the catalyst. He reminds me a bit of me. I was only 37 when I started at the Reds.”

Hoiles is considered an outsider for the role, with the former World Cup winning Waratahs and Wallabies assistant making Junior Wallabies coach Nathan Gray one of the favourites.

Current Waratahs assistant coach Chris Whitaker is also believed to be interested in the role, while the franchise’s only Super Rugby winner Michael Cheika has only recently been sounded out.

Decorated assistant Scott Wisemantel is another strong option, but whether he can be coaxed back into professional coaching remains to be seen.

One of the knocks on the 42-year-old Hoiles is that the former Wallabies back-rower is supposedly a new coach, despite having spent time with the Australian Sevens team and the LA Giltinis alongside Coleman.

But Connolly said age should not play a role in the decision of whether to interview Hoiles, adding that some head coaches just have it and others don’t.

“Oh, no,” said Connolly. ‘He’s got something.

“Club coaching, having done it himself, managing the players, getting the best out of them, that says something about him.

“I think his case needs to be argued by someone. He did something. He is gone. ‘I want to become a coach, I’m going back to club country and prove myself.’ That’s what you want everyone to do.

“He should be at the top of the interview list because NSW needs to just shoot, it is killing Australian rugby and NSW performance.”

Connolly was scathing of Australian rugby’s talent identification, saying Hoiles “could find them”, with his own unique journey to the Wallabies representative of a “smart footballer”.

“It’s not always the best players who get there, it’s the players who end up on your team,” he said.

“We didn’t find the stars because our talent ID is bad. Hoilesy was able to find them.

“Sometimes you have to have the courage to take half a step back to be able to take three steps forward, and Australian coaches do that more often than not.

“It is important to have a vision and know what a player can do in two or three years.”

In particular, Connolly said coaching was as much about the connection with players as it was about the tactics, and he thought Hoiles had shown the ability to connect with people of all ages.

“The great coaches are great with people,” Connolly said. “They are interested in people’s results and I see a little bit of that in Hoiles.”

NSW Waratah CEO Paul Doorn confirmed last month that the franchise would look to hire a director of rugby or general manager before moving on to its next coach.

Former Rebels general manager and Reds head coach Nick Stiles is seen as a serious contender for the role, while talks have been held with Andy Friend and Billy Millard.

Although former Fiji coach Simon Raiwalui is in his first few months at World Rugby, the respected coach is believed to feel indebted to NSW rugby after coming to the match in Sydney.

Sydney University director of rugby Nick Ryan is also an outside option.