Scottish Rugby performance director David Nucifora defended the decision to extend Gregor Townsend’s tenure as Scotland head coach and admitted – we found nobody better.
Townsend will remain in post until the 2027 World Cup as part of a series of high performance-related announcements that also sees his would-be successor Franco Smith handed a new two-year deal to remain in charge of Glasgow Warriors.
Glasgow managing director Al Kellock is moving on from Scotstoun after being appointed Scottish Rugby’s head of performance pathways with a view to potentially succeeding Nucifora as performance director next year.
Four other new high-performance heads have also been put in place as part of a wider departmental restructure.
It is the decision to retain Townsend, however, rather than opting to appoint a new head coach, that is the most contentious call.
The former fly-half has been in post since succeeding Vern Cotter in 2017 making him the longest-serving Scotland head coach in the professional era.
Scottish Rugby performance director David Nucifora has defended Townsend’s new deal
Townsend will now lead Scotland to the Rugby World Cup in two years’ time
Glasgow Warriors boss Franco Smith has also been handed a new deal – until 2028
Nucifora revealed he and the rest of the Scottish Rugby hierarchy – including chairman John McGuigan and chief executive Alex Williamson – keep regular tabs on the availability or otherwise of alternative coaching options.
Nucifora believes there is nobody out there that he felt would do a better job and insisted Townsend still had the requisite hunger and desire, backed by the new high performance network, to drive the team going forward.
The Australian said: ‘Gregor is a world-class coach and is doing an excellent job with regards to how he’s running the team. I’m looking for him to continue on the good work that he’s done and to build on that.
‘He’s in a position now where we’ve got a team that is maturing nicely, leading into a World Cup in 2027. He’s also going to be working in a programme now that’s fully supported.
‘Gregor’s a person that is constantly seeking to improve, to get better. He’s a curious coach. He wants to find ways to evolve both himself personally but also to evolve the team.’
Pressed on the point that not every Scotland fan will be happy with the decision, Nucifora was typically brusque in reply.
‘Sport is great, isn’t it? People base their views on emotional things. We’ve either got a glass half full or a glass half empty.
‘Our view of Gregor is that he’s got the continued level of enthusiasm and growth to be able to take this team forward.
‘We’ve got the greatest confidence that he’s going to be able to do that. Whatever I say won’t change people’s opinions of what they think should happen. That’s sport.
‘We’ve got a lot of confidence in the decisions that have been made. We’ve made the right ones.
‘We keep a really firm grasp on the availability of coaches around the world. We know who’s available and probably more importantly who’s not available.’
Asked if he felt there was nobody out there who would have done a better job, Nucifora added: ‘Exactly – otherwise we wouldn’t have signed Gregor.’
Townsend has been linked in recent weeks with a director of rugby position at the revamped Newcastle Red Bulls.
Scotland have had promising moments under Townsend but have failed to achieve concrete success in either the Six Nations or World Cup
Nucifora wouldn’t address that link directly but revealed that both Townsend and Smith have been attracting interest from elsewhere.
‘Lots of teams approach our coaches,’ he shrugged. ‘If you didn’t have quality coaches then you wouldn’t have people approaching them.
‘In this case we’ve got two guys that are up for renewal and they’re getting approaches from a range of different clubs. So that’s just par for the course.
‘You go through that all the time when you’re re-contracting coaches. That’s nothing out of the ordinary.’
There was no mention of Edinburgh head coach Sean Everitt among this raft of renewals and appointments. The South African is out of contract at the end of the season and Nucifora said talks were ongoing with a view to an extension
‘It’s unusual you actually get two coaches signed up at the same time so I think the chance of pulling off the trifecta was pretty low,’ he added.
‘But we’ll continue to speak to Sean over the next few weeks. We’re not trying to pre-empt anything but the conversation with Sean will be, ‘does he want to stay on?’ and we’ll assess how that’s going.’
