Stand Up Magazine - Issue 39 - Ulster Rugby Supporters' Club

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If it is decided that a new DoR or coach is required, who will be involved in recruiting that and deciding who is fit for purpose? The only position we are currently looking to add for next season to the current management team would be a defensive role. In terms of that, I’ll be responsible for going out into the market and seeing who is available. In terms of final decision, that will be a joint decision. There will be a huge amount of due diligence going into anyone we look to bring in, and ensuring that they are the right person to fit into the culture we are trying to promote. A big part of that will be Jono – he’s the Head Coach and is the one that will be working directly with them on a day to day basis and it’s absolutely crucial that he is happy with any appointment. Ultimately if we bring anyone in, it will be a joint decision between myself, Jono and the rest of the coaching staff and will require the PGB to be fully behind it. What’s the likelihood we will carry out a worldwide search end up finding the best candidate already on our doorstep (e.g. Lisburn)? That’s an interesting one. We are at the point where we have to start rebuilding right from the very bottom. We have to. That is the reality. We need to be sure we have strong foundations in place. That means getting the right type of people in here, with the right characteristics. That applies both to players and management. That means when we go out on a search, we don’t hire someone purely on their credentials. It has to be someone we know is going to fit. If that turns out to be someone local, then it’s somebody local. If it’s someone in Australia or New Zealand, then so be it. We don’t put boundaries on it. The next part once we have identified our no 1 target is to get them, but if they’re the best, you can bet your bottom dollar that we won’t be the only club looking to hire him. There’ll be at least half a dozen other clubs talking to him. The next bit is to try to sell the club, sell the province to him and show him the vision we have going forward which, given where we are, is not straightforward but at least presents a great opportunity for anyone coming in. Does the number of “Firings” (for want of a better term - we know that some coaches left after not having their contracts renewed) – make Ulster hard to sell to potential targets? If they think we are a “firing club”, why should they come to Ulster? To be brutally honest, I don’t think so. We tend to look at Rugby as a bit of a microcosm and think internally that we’ve gone through a number of coaches whether at the end of their contract or not. Whenever you look at a number of other clubs, they’ve done exactly the same. We tend to focus on ourselves, but having analysed others, I don’t think we have a horrific history of moving on coaches. It is a transient life and coaches understand that the average life-cycle for a coach is at one club around three years anyway. Some stay longer, some don’t. It’s the ones at the high end that are in the spotlight when they move on. I don’t think coaches will now look at us and think, “If things don’t go well for a few months, I’ll be hung out to dry.” We need certainty and stability more than anything at this point. The way I will be selling things to any potential coach is that we’re starting from scratch here and it would be a great opportunity for any coach to stamp their authority on a fairly young group, and hopefully any potential target would be excited by that. Several weeks before his departure, Les stated that “We have got a new person to replace Christian and we will announce that in due course. It’s an overseas player and all that has been cleared, so no problems.” – That turned out to be Stephen Donald, but no announcement came until Ulster were knocked out of the Champions Cup, and was to the effect that Donald is injured and won’t be coming after all. Was there more to this than a simple injury? Was the contract conditional on Ulster reaching the Q/F of Europe? NO. It was 100% that he was coming. I had finalised that deal three weeks before the end of the Japanese league and we had discussed over the phone when would be the best time to make an announcement. Funnily enough, we were both in agreement, “let’s just leave it until you get through the season”. We agreed for the same reason – he didn’t want to risk putting it out there and risk it falling through in case he got an injury, and we kinda

laughed about it because I said we’ve had a lot of bad luck with injuries, particularly with our foreign guys, so we were both more than happy to leave it, fingers crossed until he had got through his three games. We kept up communication through those three games and he got through his second last game, then I thought he had got through his last one okay, but they’re not televised over here so I didn’t see it, but it was stomach drop feeling when he texted me to say, “you won’t believe this, but with 20 minutes to go I twisted my knee and I don’t know how bad it is but it’s very swollen”. Ultimately, the way we looked at it, because of the horrendous luck we’ve had with injuries outside of our control, the last thing in the world we were going to do was bring in somebody who wasn’t able to take to the field for a minimum of 4-5 weeks. It made no sense to do so, and Stephen and I were very much in agreement that we couldn’t proceed. It was unfortunate in one way, but it also coincided with Jonny McPhillips having a couple of cameo appearances resulting in one of the very few rays of light in a couple of very poor performances. That veered us away from looking for a replacement for Stephen Donald. Jonny has been patient, he’s bided his time, he’s done very well, so we just need to have confidence and faith that he will be the guy moving forward over the next few weeks.

Photo by John Dickson, DicksonDigital.com

Assuming Johnny does make the grade, we have been fortunate in previous years not to have injuries at 10. Are all our eggs going to be on Jonny next season? We surely need to have back-up cover at 10, whether he’s the main man or the cover to someone else? Are you looking at any marquee signings, particularly at 10 for next season? Let’s just say it is 100% a position we are looking at, but there are too many variables at the moment which make that kind of decision difficult at this moment, but it’s a priority, shall we say to make sure we are in the right position in that area going into next season. What are the considerations and potential problems that you face when signing new players, maintaining squad strength in depth and satisfying the fans? Using, for example Schalk van der Merwe, and one of Ulster’s best players this season, but now departing Callum Black? At the time we looked to strengthen the loosehead prop position, the only way we could do something was by signing a “special project” so that was our restriction at that stage. He was signed before the changes in time period for qualification were announced in December, so he will be Irish qualified in three years. My task, as always, was to go to market, looking for loosehead props, realistically no older than 25 or 26 so that in three years time they would be a viable option for Ireland, because props obviously mature later than other positions. We put together a list of the best players fitting the criteria and then went through it with the coaches to see who might be the best fit for Ulster. At that point the coaches agreed that Schalk looked the best fit; the

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