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The thing giving Northampton 'a lot of confidence' in coach change
Mark Darbon has insisted that Northampton explored every possible avenue before confirming this week that they were happy for current assistant coach Phil Dowson to succeed Chris Boyd as their director of rugby as the end of this season. When the previous incumbent Jim Mallinder was ousted following a collapse in his team’s form at the end of his mostly progressive era in charge, the Saints went to the other end of the world to find a replacement.
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Boyd had spruced up his credentials when guiding the Wellington-based Hurricanes to its first-ever Super Rugby title in 2016 and when it came to Northampton acquiring a replacement for Mallinder, who exited in December 2017, they had no qualms about doing whatever was needed to bring the New Zealander to Franklin’s Gardens after Australian Alan Gaffney had taken temporary charge for the first six months of 2018.
This time around, Northampton have opted not to go the southern hemisphere route to source a successor to Boyd, who is returning to New Zealand for family reasons. However, in deciding to promote from within at the Saints, the club insist they didn’t just take the quick and easy option to fill the position.
Instead, Darbon assured RugbyPass that they did their homework and only then came to the conclusion that the promotion of Dowson to the director’s role and Sam Vesty to the head coach position was the best option as the rookie Northampton management team will also retain the input of Boyd who will check in as a consultant from back in New Zealand.
“This is our own plan,” explained Darbon, who insisted that Northampton hadn’t looked to any other club and copied their idea. “My view is there is always very different circumstances in different clubs. It is not my role to comment on how other clubs have done this. Of course, we looked at the market and considered our alternatives as we built this plan.
Boyd apologised to the referee in question for the comments before being cited ?https://t.co/NRQ0XkcvKT
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) January 14, 2022
“We always had this as our plan A, we were clear on the individuals that we wanted to be part of our setup and how that may evolve over time so we have always had this plan. At the same time, you have got to be quite careful not to blindly follow a plan if it is no longer relevant or if it is no longer right.
“We feel excited because we feel we have made good choices in our coaching group and we think now is an appropriate time for them to step up and what is really interesting about our model is we are promoting from within, we are promoting a relatively young group but we are doing so in a very stable environment.
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“If you look around the league, often choices have been made when people have lost their jobs or there have been periods of stress or underperformance or whatever you want to call it. We feel very settled and actually, we think continuity is a big part of achieving the success that we are so desperately craving at the moment and that gives us a lot of confidence for this transition.”
How does Dowson, the 40-year-old ex-England back-rower, shape up personality-wise to Boyd, the wise-cracking 63-year-old Kiwi with a wealthier coaching experience behind him? “They are very different characters, that is for sure, but they actually share quite a few similar traits. They are both big leaders,” continued Darbon ahead of this weekend’s Champions Cup match at home to Ulster.
“You will have seen that from Phil Dowson in his playing career, he was a leader here (at Northampton), captained the side here, has always had the respect of players and staff within this organisation and what he has been able to do really effectively is take the leadership skillset that he developed as a player and quickly applied that from a coaching perspective.
“He and Chris are also both extremely good communicators. They have a very, very different communication style but in their own way, they are very good at motivating and rallying the squad and bringing clarity to what we are trying to achieve both in the short term and in the longer term.
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“Those key traits, leadership and strong communication, we believe give you a really strong platform to work from when you are taking on an extremely difficult role as a director of rugby that is craving success. Phil has undoubtedly developed that skillset under Chris and he will have also learned a lot about the intricacies of the role because he has had a lot of exposure to that.
“Chris gives a lot of autonomy and creates an environment where there is a lot of involvement for the coaches. Phil has had a great chance to assimilate that knowledge and learn from it and we think that will stand him in good stead.”
Comments on RugbyPass
Following his dream and putting in the work. Go well young fella!
3 Go to commentsPerhaps filling Twickenham is one of Mitchell’s KPIs. I doubt whether both September matches will be at Twickenham on consecutive weekends. I would take the BF one to a large provincial stadium so as not to give them the advantage and experience of playing at Twickenham before a large crowd prior to the RWC.
1 Go to commentsvery unfortunate for Kitshoff, but big opportunity potentially for Nché to prove he is genuinely the best loosehead in the world, rather than just a specialist finisher. Presuming that if Kitshoff is out, it will also give Steenekamp a chance to come into the 23? Or are others likely to be ahead of him?
1 Go to commentsA long held question in popular culture asks if art imitates life or does the latter influence the former? Over this 6 nations I can ask the same question of the media influencing the thoughts of its audience or vice versa. Nobody wants to see cricket scores in rugby, as a spectacle it is not sustainable. With so many articles about England’s procession and lack of competition it feeds the epicaricacy of many looking for an opportunity to pounce. England are not the first team to dominate nor does it happen only in rugby, think Federer, Nadal, Red Bull or Mercedes, Manchester Utd, Australia in tests and World Cups. Instead of celebrating the achievements why find reasons to falsify it pointing towards larger playing pool, professional for a longer period or mitigate with the lack of growth in other nations. Can we not enjoy it while it is here and know that it won’t last for ever, others coveting what England have will soon take the crown, ask the aforementioned?
6 Go to commentsShame he won’t turn out for the Netherlands now they’re improving. U20s are Euro champs and in the U20 Trophy this year. The senior sides gets better every year too.
3 Go to commentsWill rugbypass tv be showing these games?
1 Go to commentsWell where do you start, the fact that England have a professional domestic league and Ireland’s is fully amatuer, that they have fully seperated professional squads at Fifteens and Sevens (7’s thinly disguised as GB), and Ireland have fully pro Sevens squad who loan some players back to the Semi-Professional Fifteens squad (moved from amateur for only a year or so) for a few games at 6N & RWC’s. The Women’s games is a shambles, and is at risk of killing itself by pushing for professionalism when the market isn’t really there to support it outside one or two countnries..
6 Go to commentsWayne Smith's input didn't have as much impact on the last final as Davison's red card for Thompson. England were 14 points up and flying when that happened.
6 Go to commentsBilly's been playing consistently well for 2 - 3 seasons now and deserves a look in at the top level. Ioane and ALB are still first choice but there needs to be injury cover and succession. His partnership with Jordie gives him first dibs you'd think. Go the Hurricanes.
3 Go to commentsIt’s not up to Wales to support Georgian Rugby. That’s up to International Rugby and Georgia. I sympathise with Georgia’s decent attempt to create this fixture. But for Wales the proposed match up is just a potential stick to beat them with and a potential big psychological blow that young Welsh team doesn’t need. (I’m Irish BTW.)
2 Go to commentsCale certainly looks great in space, but as you say, he has struggled in contact. At 23 years old, turning 24 this year, he should be close to full physical maturity and yet there exists a considerable gap in the power and physicality required for international rugby. Weight doesn’t automatically equate to power and physicality either. Can he go from a player who’s being physically dominated in Super rugby to physically dominating in international rugby in 1 or 2 years? That’s a big ask but he may end up being a late bloomer.
28 Go to commentsIf rugby wants to remain interesting in the AI era then it will need to work on changing the rules. AI will reduce the tactical advantage of smart game plans, will neutralize primary attacking weapons, and will move rugby from a being a game of inches to a game of millimetres. It will be about sheer athleticism and technique,about avoiding mistakes, and about referees. Many fans will find that boring. The answer is to add creative degrees of freedom to the game. The 50-22 is an example. But we can have fun inventing others, like the right to add more players for X minutes per game, or the equivalent of the 2-point conversion in American football, the ability to call a 12-player scrum, etc. Not saying these are great ideas, but making the point that the more of these alternatives you allow, the less AI will be able to lock down high-probability strategies. This is not because AI does not have the compute power, but because it has more choices and has less data, or less-specific data. That will take time and debate, but big, positive and immediate impact could be in the area of ref/TMO assistance. The technology is easily good enough today to detect forward passes, not-straight lineouts, offside at breakdown/scrum/lineout, obstruction, early/late tackles, and a lot of other things. WR should be ultra aggressive in doing this, as it will really help in an area in which the game is really struggling. In the long run there needs to be substantial creativity applied to the rules. Without that AI (along with all of the pro innovations) will turn rugby into a bash fest.
24 Go to commentsSouth Africa rarely play Ireland and France on these tours. Mostly, England, Scotland and Wales. I wonder why
2 Go to commentsIt was a let’s-see-what-you're-made-of type of a game. The Bulls do look good when the opposition allows them to, but Munster shut them down, and they could not find a way through. Jake should be very worried about their chances in the competition.
2 Go to commentsHats off to Fabian for a very impressive journey to date. Is it as ‘uniquely unlikely’ as Rugby Pass suggests, given Anton Segner’s journey at the Blues?
3 Go to commentsSad that this was not confirmed. When administrators talk about expanding the game they evidently don’t include pathways to the top tier of rugby for teams outside of the old boys club. Rugby deserves better, and certainly Georgia does.
2 Go to commentsLions might take him on if they move on Van Rooyen but I doubt he will want to go back, might consider it a step backwards for himself. Sharks would take him on but if Plumtree goes on to win the challenge cup they will keep him on. Also sharks showing some promising signs recently. Stormers and Bulls are stable and Springboks are already filled up. Quality coach though, interesting to see where he ends up
1 Go to commentsAnd the person responsible for creating a culture of accountability is?
3 Go to commentsMore useless words from Ben Smith -Please get another team to write about. SA really dont need your input, it suck anyway.
264 Go to commentsThis disgraceful episode must result in management and coach team sackings. A new manager with worse results than previous and the coaching staff need to coached. Awful massacre led by donkeys.
1 Go to comments