‘Disappointed’ Stuart Lancaster criticises Rugby Australia after Wallabies coach recruitment process
Ex-Racing 92 boss Stuart Lancaster
Former England boss Stuart Lancaster has hit out at the way he was treated by Rugby Australia in his unsuccessful bid to succeed Joe Schmidt as Wallabies coach.
Released as Racing 92 boss earlier this year, the 2015 Rugby World Cup coach was interviewed twice by the Australians, but the process ultimately left a sour taste after he was then left in the dark and not kept up to date about the recruitment.
It was only when a recruiter belatedly rang to say he hadn’t got the job that Lancaster finally learned that Schmidt wasn’t exiting the role after this year’s Rugby Championship and will now instead hand over the reins next year.
Les Kiss was named on April 30 as Schmidt’s eventual successor, taking over in 2026, and Lancaster has since opened up about his disappointment in the latest episode of his Leaders on Leaders YouTube series.
Asked to explain what had happened with the approach from Australia, the 55-year-old said: “Australia rang and I definitely felt they said very strongly. ‘Listen, Joe is going to finish after Rugby Championship, we need someone to come in and help us lead into the 2027 World Cup’.
“It’s a shame…”
“I felt certainly burnt out but when the call came I was, ‘This is an exciting challenge, a chance to go to a different country’. I thought I learned a lot from England, Ireland, and France.
“I thought diversity of thought in a country is really important and I thought the knowledge I gained in those roles and the pathways stuff I had done and the understanding of that and the different gameplan, so lots of things I could bring.
“Also the excitement of going to work with a talented group of players who I felt having watched their games could be improved quite quickly. And going into high performance in Australia where you have got league coach, rules coaches, AIS is excellent so the excitement of going and learning from other coaches and passing on what you have learned in a new environment was appealing.
“When the call came I felt I don’t feel so burnt out, I had the feeling this is something I can commit to. The challenge from the family point of view is I put it under pressure in lots of different ways and now I am going to do it again. I’m potentially going to live in Australia. My mum is 82. What do you do with the two dogs? Can my wife make it out? Will I live on my own like I did in Leinster? So there was all that to consider but at the time it was definitely positive.”
That feeling didn’t last, however. “It’s a shame. The initial enthusiasm for the role remained. This was the start of February and when I finally realised I wasn’t going to go to Australia was last week (late April), so we are talking nearly three months.
“You present your vision to the panel, you do a second interview, you meet key people, you wait for feedback. One of the lessons I would give any organisation is my personal experience that I have just gone through: say there are three or four candidates to interview for the role, your decision as an organisation whether you are giving someone the job or not is life-changing for the candidate.
“If you don’t give them the role, their life will carry on in the same direction, but if you give them the role their life will change direction considerably, so you have a responsibility to be honest and transparent and consistent with your communication.
“So if someone presents, like I did to a panel and then I wait for feedback and you don’t get any, I chased the feedback up and said, ‘What is happening?’ They said, ‘We are just going through the process, we will be back in contact’.
“And then the-do-what-you-say-you-are-going-to-do piece is actually critical now… Eventually, you start thinking I am going to have to ring to find out what is going on because life is on hold, you don’t know and there are shifting sands, things are changing but I am not really clear on why they are changing.
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“I don’t mind if they are changing, I get the fact that in a complex recruitment process, there might be a different dynamic at play, they are interviewing different coaches or they are thinking we are going to go down this route and not that route. Whatever. I don’t mind. Just tell me. Don’t not say anything.
“Everyone is grown up here. I just need to know what is going on and to not have that the more and more it went on, the more disappointed I became. In the end, last week I got a phone call to say actually Joe is going to stay on now until 2026 and there is no job at all. I was like, ‘Ah’.
“So for the last three months I was sat waiting thinking am I potentially going to live in Sydney and how would it work, this is my vision for the role and I’m getting excited about it to the point where you are thinking I am not sure this is not going to happen and then to find out it is definitely not going to happen.
“The feedback I gave was one of the rules of leadership, that bad news should never come as a shock so if you had known this was potentially going to happen, you should have let me know so at least then I could have moved on and there are other opportunities out there so why wait.
“So, how am I feeling at the moment? The disillusionment piece (from getting sacked at Racing) has definitely not been helped by the process I have been through… I wish they just told me that.”
In the meantime, Lancaster has been busy following up on other leads.
“I wouldn’t say no if I had to go back to France. I probably wouldn’t go back as a No1, I’d go under a French No1 probably. I can definitely go back in an organisation that was motivated and can see potential. I don’t think with the next job but I wouldn’t say no to that,” he continued.
“The southern hemisphere is always an attraction, but the Australia thing isn’t going to happen. New Zealand tend not to appoint coaches from outside New Zealand. There might be one or two chances to build relationships in South Africa, which I would be keen to explore and obviously the northern hemisphere, there is club and international jobs coming up, but again it goes down to fit, they have got to want you and you have got to want to go.
“One of the things that happened during this season, my mentor Kevin Bowring, passed away tragically in October. He had a heart attack. I was privileged to be asked to do his eulogy. The emotion of that week in my life and Kevin not being there had a profound effect on me, and I do want to do a Kevin Bowring role in the future, coach the coaches.
“There is the thing I can offer, I get really motivated by helping coaches and also tend to always reach out to coaches who are struggling because I know what it feels like, how lonely it is.
“I am doing something for the League Managers Association, so in football in England, they have a mentoring scheme and also a counselling scheme for managers, which I think is really important so again that lonely leaders role when you have not got a job or whatever.
“The ups and downs of sport, I have been through a lot of it. So I am on their programme as someone who can support, so I am available to do things there for football, which is good. I am doing some stuff for UK Sport in England and generally wherever a coach reaches out – and I am not talking about the top-end coaches, a lot of coaches reach out in different ways – I try and help where I can, pass on what I have learned.
“I get real motivation out of that, and I see a future in that, but I really love the relationship with players, I love coaching players. As a 55-year-old coaching 25-year-olds, it keeps you young, and I feel I still have the ability to connect, so I back myself for sure in terms of my knowledge of the game, the experiences I have had.
“Going back to the teaching, once a teacher, always a teacher type thing. So I think a coaching job leading into coach the coaches in the future.”
On his abrupt Racing exit, Lancaster added: “You lose a bit of faith. I definitely felt burnt out after Racing. I felt a bit disillusioned really with what happened. Why would I keep putting my family in this position, going into this crazy world of sport as a coach?
“You know you can work every hour that god sends and coach the best you can, but ultimately still not be in control of the outcome. So there is definitely, for the first time, a sense of disillusionment for sure. I am still working my way through that.
“It’s not to say I am going throw the towel in and do something else or just coach the coaches, but I’m 55, so why would you keep putting yourself through this pressure? Most coaches are waiting to get sacked, so why would put yourself in that position? That’s how I felt initially after Racing but then you get a phone call from Australia…”
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