Will Stuart Lancaster be a uniting force at Connacht?
The news that Stuart Lancaster is taking over as the head coach of Connacht has caused huge excitment out west.
The former England head coach and Leinster senior coach, who departed from his most recent role at Racing 92 in February, has signed a two-year deal to succeed Pete Wilkins who resigned in April.
It's a serious coup for Connacht.
During Lancaster's seven seasons in Dublin, Leinster won the 2018 Champions Cup as well as four successive Pro14 titles. If he brings even a fraction of that success to his new job he'll be given hero status, and while there's no guarantees in top-level rugby, the Against The Head panel are certain the province is bringing in a figure of real pedigree.
"I think he's done more for Connacht this week than spending €100,000 on an advertising campaign, because he's got to Galway, he's met the staff, he's met some of the players, and everyone knows what he did in Leinster," said Bernard Jackman.
"You speak to any of the Leinster players, they're incredibly complimentary about his understanding of how to build, how to coach, how to run training sessions which at Leinster is hard because of the numbers but he ran brilliant training sessions, his philosophy on the game, how he develops leadership culture. I think Connacht players are ecited, Connacht fans are excited.
"He's a great get. Fair play to the IRFU and Connacht for getting him.
"I think it also shows the investment they made in facilities is obviously important for the players and staff, but someone like him... he was on the short list for the Wales job, he was down to the last two for Australia. If he'd bided his time he could have got some big jobs in Europe and he's picked Connacht."
Donal Lenihan echoed those sentiments, highlighting the quality of the Connacht production line as another factor that potentially lured Lancaster back to Ireland.
"The fact he was over there to watch his son (Dan) playing for Racing recently obviously opened his eyes to what's happened out west for the past number of years," he said. "But there is an incredible number of real quality young players.
"I think Lancaster is tailor-made for them. If I was in charge of selling season tickets for Connacht I'd be absolutely thrilled because my job has been done overnight.
"I was out with Johnny Sexton at a function recently and he spoke in glowing terms about what Lancaster did for Leinster.
"Just his capacity to bring everybody on board, to actually coach, to improve players, to work with people and make them better. People then as a consequence really want to work with him, for him. That's a uniting element in any dressing room."
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