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England Rugby have confirmed the addition of Richard Cockerill and Anthony Seibold as part of a ‘finalised’ senior men’s coaching set-up.
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The dramatic capture of Cockerill from Edinburgh was unofficially a done deal for well over a month. Seibold replaces John Mitchell as defence coach.
The 50-year-old joins as a forwards coach and will work alongside Matt Proudfoot. An England statement described him as having “a distinguished playing career, winning 27 caps for England and making more than 250 appearances for Leicester Tigers, along with spells with Coventry and Montferrand.”
Cockerill became Leicester head coach in 2009 and won the Premiership title on three occasions – 2009, 2010 and 2013. Cockerill had a brief stint as a rugby consultant at Toulon before spending four years at Edinburgh Rugby, where he was credited with turning around their PRO14 fortunes and transforming them into a more competitive outfit.
Jones said: “We’re two years from the World Cup so we wanted to freshen up our coaching team and get the right people in place for where we want to go – which is to win the World Cup.
“We’ve added Richard to the team to work with Matt to create a dominant forward pack. He’s a former England player, has great coaching experience and comes in as a well-rounded, mature, driven English coach.
“Anthony is a coach that I have had a relationship with since 2019 and have followed his career closely. He is a good coach and thinks deeply about the game. John Mitchell did a great job improving us in defence and Anthony will add further nuances to the good system that he has put into place.
“It’s an exciting time for rugby with the new season starting, supporters back in the stadium and the return of the grassroots game this weekend – with the rugby community celebrating being back together at Pitch Up for Rugby events around the country. We’re looking forward to getting the squad back together and growing this England team.”
Cockerill said: “I am excited to be joining Eddie Jones and the England team, working with the players and staff.
“I look forward to being part of and contributing to the world class environment that is England Rugby.”
Meanwhile Rugby League convert Seibold has been appointed as England defence coach. He arrives from his most recent role as head coach of the Brisbane Broncos in Australia’s National Rugby League. He was previously head coach at South Sydney Rabbitohs, where he was named the NRL Daily M coach of the year in 2018 and has coached at a number of clubs including Manly Sea Eagles, Melbourne Storm and Queensland in the State of Origin series.
Seibold’s playing career, included spells in England with Hull KR and London Broncos, along with Canberra Raiders and Brisbane Broncos in the NRL. He is currently a coaching mentor at Newcastle Knights.
BORING: Jake Connor has served back at Eddie Jones. https://t.co/k42E7i513o
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) September 3, 2021
Seibold said: “I am very much looking forward to joining the England coaching staff and building upon the work that has been done by the coaching staff and players over recent seasons. Eddie is one of the leading coaches in world sport and the opportunity to work under him through to the 2023 World Cup in France along with the other staff was an opportunity that I could not pass up.
“The depth of talent and the opportunity to work with the elite players in the English game is something that really excites me going forward. I am looking forward to the opportunity and the challenge that international rugby presents.”
The coaching team will first work with the England squad at a mini-camp at The Lensbury next month. England will then begin preparations for their three Test matches at Twickenham Stadium this autumn with a week’s training camp in Jersey in late Ocotober. They will be hosted by Jersey Reds and use the facilities at the Strive high performance centre.
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Comments on RugbyPass
🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
26 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
1 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusades , you can keep going.
1 Go to commentsI don't know how the locals feel about that? I guess if you call yourselves the Worcester Wasps that might be appease. But really we need more teams in the Premiership in my view so they are not padding it out as they are at the moment. It might curtail so many players going abroad as well
5 Go to commentsNZ 😭😭😭is certainly rivaling England for best whingers cup!😭😭😭 !!!
26 Go to commentsYup. New Zealand won 3 out of 10 world cups played. SA 4 out of 8 attempts 30 Vs 50 per cent.🤔🤔
26 Go to commentsShould've done this years ago. Change Saturday kick off times to around 11am. Up and off and back home before 3pm, limit travel time too. Allows players to actually do something else with their Saturday that's family oriented or being rugby fans they could ‘watch’ pro rugby. Increases crowds etc. How can anyone that enjoys grassroots and pro rugby have to choose between the two on Saturdays?
9 Go to commentsI bet he inspired those supporters just as much.
1 Go to commentsBen Smith Springboks living rent free in his head 😊😂
67 Go to commentsGood to hear he would like to play the game at the highest level, I hadn’t been to sure how much of a motivator that was before now. Sadly he’s probably chosen the rugby club to go to. Try not to worry about all the input about how you should play rugby Joey and just try to emulate what you do on the league field and have fun. You’ll limit your game too much (well not really because he’s a standard athlete like SBW and he’ll still have enough) if you’re trying to make sure you can recycle the ball back etc. On the other hard, you can totally just try and recycle by looking to offload any and everywhere if you’re going to ground 😋
1 Go to commentsThis just proves that theres always a stat and a metric to use to justify your abilities and your success. Ben did it last week by creating an imaginary competition and now you did the same to counter his argument and espouse a new yardstick for success. Why not just use the current one and lets say the Boks have won 4 world cups making them the most successful world cup team. Outside of the world cup the All Blacks are the most successful team winning countless rugby championships and dominating the rankings with high win percentages. Over the last 4 years statistically the Irish are the best having the highest win rate and also having positive records against every tier 1 side. The most successful Northern team in the game has been England with a world cup title and the most six nations titles in history. The AB’s are the most dominant team in history with the highest win rate and 3 world cups. Lets not try to reinvent the wheel. Just be honest about the actual stats and what each team has been good at doing and that will be enough to define their level of success.
26 Go to commentsHow is 7’s played there? I’m surprised 10 or 11 man rugby hasn’t taken off. 7 just doesn’t fit the 15s dynamics (rules n field etc) but these other versions do.
9 Go to commentsPick Swinton at your peril A liability just like JWH from the Roosters Skelton ??? went missing at RWC
14 Go to commentsLike tennis, who have a ranking system, and I believe rugby too, just measure over each period preceding a world cup event who was the longest number one and that would be it. In tennis the number one player frequently is not the grand slam winner. I love and adore the All Blacks since the days of Ian Kirkpatrick when I was a kid in SA. And still do because they are the masters of running rugby and are gentleman on and off the field - in general. And in my opinion they have been the majority of the time the best rugby team in the world.
26 Go to commentsHaving overseas possessions in 2024 is absurd. These Frenchies should have to give the New Caledonians their freedom.
21 Go to commentsBell injured his foot didn’t he? Bring Tupou in he’ll deliver when it counts. Agree mostly but I would switch in the Reds number 8 Harry Wilson for Swinton and move Rob Valentini to 6 instead. Wilson is a clever player who reads the play, you can’t outmuscle the AB’s and Springboks, if you have any chance it’s by playing clever. Same goes for Paisami, he’s a little guy who doesn’t really trouble the likes of De Allende and Jordie Barrett. I’d rather play Carter Gordon at 12 and put Michael Lynagh’s boy at 10. That way you get a BMT type goalkicker at 10 and a playmaker at 12. Anyways, just my two cents as a Bok supporter.
14 Go to commentsThanks Brett, love your articles which are alway pertinent. It’s a difficult topic trying to have a panel adjudicating consistently penalties for red card issues. Many of the mitigating reasons raised are judged subjectively, hence the different outcomes. How to take away subjective opinions?
11 Go to comments