Connacht have had plenty of fine coaches in their time, Warren Gatland, Pat Lam and Andy Friend among them, but no appointment will ever have grabbed wider attention and generated such excitement among the province’s players and supporters alike as much as Stuart Lancaster.
First and foremost, securing Lancaster as Connacht’s next head coach is a coup for the IRFU and their performance director David Humphreys, as well as a clear statement of the province’s ambition.
After all, Lancaster brings a wealth of experience from his four years as England head coach, seven seasons as Leinster senior coach and year-and-a-half as head coach of Racing 92. Furthermore, so well regarded is he that Lancaster was recently shortlisted and strongly considered by the Australian Rugby Union as the next Wallabies head coach, prompting him to be critical of the process.
Clearly therefore, Connacht and the IRFU satisfied Lancaster with their ambition and vision for the immediate future, and presumably the prospect of the Dexcom Stadium’s revamp into a 12,000-capacity ground would have been part of the appeal.
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Word is that the anticipated unveiling of the new stand will be at the Connacht v Leinster URC game on Saturday, January 24th. This will be the return fixture after Leinster host Connacht on January 3rd, games which certainly will now have a new intrigue.
Lancaster’s arrival out west is also a timely fillip after a difficult and anticlimactic campaign which saw Connacht finish 13th in the URC table – two places lower than the previous season – and lose out on a home semi-final in the Challenge Cup when beaten in the quarter-finals in Galway by Racing.
Connacht’s squad is capable of better than that but didn’t help themselves by conceding points in flurries only to start playing to their potential when well behind on the scoreboard. There were mitigating factors, not least playing in front of an empty building site which previously housed the Clan Terrace, as well as the coaching upheaval which saw Pete Wilkins take sick leave and then ultimately depart before Benetton announced his appointment as their new attack coach within a month.
With Mark Sexton and Scott Fardy also set to depart as the respective attack and defence coaches, Collie Tucker assumed the head coaching role on an interim basis. Tucker will remain as scrum and contact coach, while Lancaster will also oversee defence alongside new attack coach Rod Seib, and lineout and maul coach John Muldoon.
Admittedly this ticket does seem a little cobbled together seeing as Seib was hired initially to work under Wilkins and it’s noticeable that Lancaster has only signed a two-year deal. Still, his appointment will be well received, not least as his teams play a brand of rugby that has become synonymous with Connacht since Lam’s days.
The 55-year-old has a well-deserved reputation for developing talented young players from his time with Leeds Tykes, the RFU and in his four seasons as England’s head coach, when they finished second in four successive Six Nations before being eliminated as hosts at the 2015 World Cup in a pool featuring Wales and Australia.
Lancaster returned to more of a hands-on coaching role with Leinster after their particularly difficult 2014-15 campaign when losing five of their six European pool matches and the Pro12 final to Connacht in Edinburgh. He helped to harness their multiphase, high-tempo game during what the players dubbed ‘Stuesdays’ as their production line of internationals went into overdrive. Leinster also reached four Champions Cup finals, winning the 2018 decider against Racing, and won four Pro14 titles in a row.
This made him highly coveted but the move to Racing 92 never felt right, not least because he spoke little or no French and the Top 14 is a relatively cut-throat place for imported coaches.
Even Michael Cheika, in between guiding Leinster and the Waratahs to breakthrough Champions Cup and Super Rugby successes, was the victim of a very French coup after just two seasons with Stade Francais in 2012.
But Cheika lasted longer than the short-lived tenures of Rory Teague at Bordeaux Bègles, Mike Ford at Toulon and Richard Cockerill at Montpellier, when fired just seven games into last season’s campaign after six straight defeats.
Having finished fifth and reached the French championship semi-finals in the 2022/23 season, under Lancaster they finished sixth and lost 31-17 away to Bordeaux Bègles in ‘le barrage’ last season. But, in early February, the club and Lancaster parted ways with Racing 12th and outside both the playoffs and Champions Cup qualification.
But this means Connacht have hired a hungry coach determined to prove himself again and who has an innate understanding of the Irish set-up as well as a genuine fondness for it.
A couple of weeks ago, Lancaster revealed on Off The Ball that he and his wife Nina had been to Galway in mid-April to watch a Racing team featuring their son Dan beat Connacht 43-40, prompting them to think, as he put it: “Oh God, we miss Ireland.”
Unhesitatingly, Lancaster also admitted he would be interested in returning – “I wouldn’t rule out coming back at all” – and reflected on his seven seasons with Leinster as “the best time of my career”.
As in life, some coaches are just a better fit in some countries than others. Connacht will hope that one day Lancaster will reflect just as fondly on his time with them.
