Cheika: Australia’s man for the poisoned chalice
Passionate and volatile, new Wallabies coach could transform Aussies into a force for the World Cup
Michael Cheika, who was appointed Australia coach on Wednesday, is a maverick, forceful and sometimes volatile coach who has never shied away from accepting what others might consider a poisoned chalice.
The 47-year-old has a fervent belief that there is a right and a wrong way to play rugby and is the only man to have coached teams to both Heineken Cup and Super Rugby titles.
It took him four years to transform Leinster from a province in disarray into European champions in 2009 and two years to drag a dysfunctional New South Wales Waratahs outfit to the pinnacle of southern hemisphere rugby.
[Cheika] likes his forwards to get stuck in, get physical and get dirty. Then let the backs do the work out wide
He will need every ounce of those transformative powers over the next 11 months if he is to turn the Wallabies into genuine contenders for a third World Cup triumph on British soil.
Cheika's teams aspire to play an expansive, attacking game once known as the "Randwick Way" after one of Australia's most successful clubs, which is based in the seaside suburb of Coogee where he grew up as the son of Lebanese immigrants.
An uncompromising number eight not afraid to let his fists do the talking at Randwick in the 1980s, Cheika helped lay the platform which allowed the likes of David Campese and the Ella brothers to strut their stuff.
His rugby journey has been anything but a straightforward path from Coogee Oval across Sydney harbour to the offices of the Australian Rugby Union in the leafy North Shore suburb of St Leonards, though.