‘Ignore them, they’re useless’ – Brian O’Driscoll details hilarious Michael Cheika exchange during Premiership Final
Ireland legend Brian O’Driscoll has detailed the exchange between him and Michael Cheika during the Premiership Final.
The Leicester Tigers boss was animated on the sidelines during the clash against Bath at the Allianz Stadium in Twickenham, particularly after his captain Julian Montoya was penalised shortly after returning to the pitch.
The Argentine hooker was deemed to have illegally pilfered over the ball, a decision that clearly enraged Cheika on the sidelines.
O’Driscoll-Cheika exchange
Leicester’s boss was seen pulling some of his assistant coaches away from the fourth official by the broadcasters before walking past O’Driscoll, who was providing punditry for TNT Sports, and making another comment.
While it looked as if he had said something to the former Ireland centre, O’Driscoll revealed that Cheika was in fact speaking to another Tigers’ member of staff who was standing directly behind him.
“I wasn’t expecting the cameras to come over there,” the ex-Ireland captain explained on Off the Ball Sports.
“It was a sunny day, I was entitled to have my shades on and next thing, Cheiks comes running down from the box and there’s a bad call on Montoya who got penalised for hands in the ruck and it looked as though it was a perfectly good poach.
“Anyway, Chieks was kind of pulling some of his staff away from talking to the fourth official, but making a point of pulling him away, saying to ‘ignore them, they’re useless’, blah blah.
“He was kind of roaming around, and then another one of his staff was standing behind me ,and he came over and started giving out about the referee to him, but it almost looked as though it was to me as well.
“It was like ‘I haven’t done anything’ and I could see the camera panning to us and I didn’t know it was on us for as long as it was, but I just started laughing then.”
O’Driscoll also revealed that the former Leinster coach popped him a message after the match after being sent the video.
“In fairness to Cheiks, his wife sent it to him after the game and then he immediately sent it on to me, saying ‘I’m glad we’re still making memories out there, man’,” the former centre concluded.
Fuming Cheika
Cheika was clearly upset about the officiating of the game and expressed his dismay during the press conference following his side’s 23-21 loss to Bath, who won their first Premiership title in 29 years.
“I thought we got nothing back from the referee at all and we kept on coming back and turning up,” said Cheika.
“We scored three tries to two, that tells you something. I’m super proud of the players.
“Two men in the bin – the second one [Dan Cole’s yellow card] for nothing, really. It is embarrassing for the game that someone goes off for that.
“I’m allowed to be angry, but I’m over it and happy to accept the result now and get on with the next thing.”
The Premiership final proved to be Cheika’s last game in charge of Leicester, with the former Wallabies boss returning to Australia.
He has been linked to roles in France but has stated that he is keen to chance his arm in the NRL if the opportunity arises.
READ MORE: Michael Cheika left fuming over Premiership final decision which is ’embarrassing for the game’
