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O'Gara sets off for La Rochelle with farewell tweet for the Crusaders

Assistant coach Ronan O'Gara poses with a Crusaders fan during the civic reception for the 2019 Super Rugby champions in Christchurch (Photo by Kai Schwoerer/Getty Images)

Less than a week after helping the Crusaders secure a third successive Super Rugby title, Irish rugby legend Ronan O’Gara has already set off for his next job. 

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The former British and Irish Lion has spent the past two seasons as backs coach under Scott Robertson in New Zealand and is now set to take over as head coach of Top 14 side La Rochelle. 

O’Gara shared a picture of his bags at the airport, thanking Robertson for the opportunity and describing his time with the Crusaders as an “adventure”. 

La Rochelle’s pre-season training started this week, but the 128-cap international will still have plenty of time to work with the team before the season starts. 

The long-time Munster fly-half has already built a wealth of experience in his relatively short coaching career, having also won a French league title with Racing 92 working in the backroom staff. 

He called the Crusaders set-up a “unique environment”, which is understandable as they have just secured an unprecedented 10th Super Rugby title. 

O’Gara has not only been working under many people’s All Blacks head coach in waiting but with a side that is probably the best domestic team on the planet, although Saracens and Leinster come close. 

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O’Gara was one of the finest tacticians the game has ever seen as a player, and he was always destined to have success as a coach given his rugby brain. These just seem like stepping stones before he one day returns to Thomond Park and eventually Ireland.

While it has surely been a great adventure with the Crusaders, a new challenge awaits as he is given the reins of a club for the very first time. 

The La Rochelle faithful will hope that the winning mentality that courses through the Super Rugby champions will be brought to the west coast of France with the Irishman. 

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Flankly 2 hours ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


Borthwick has been in the job for nearly two years, a period that includes two 6N programs and an RWC campaign. So where are the solid foundations that he has been building?

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