Waratahs pledge to stand by Hickey






NSW Rugby Union chairman Ed Zemancheff yesterday moved to kill off speculation about the Waratahs coaching position, insisting Chris Hickey will remain in the job at least until his contract expires at the end of next year.

Despite the fact the Waratahs are fourth on the table approaching the midway point of the Super 14, Hickey has come under fire over the quality of his team's play.
Speculation has been rife he will be replaced as coach at the end of the season, although some of the heat has been taken out of such talk after Heineken Cup-winning coach Michael Cheika -- who was widely tipped to take over from him -- signed last week with Stade Francais.
Even then the whispering campaign did not let up, with Hickey's forwards coach Michael Foley merely substituting for Cheika as the supposed replacement-in-waiting.
An exasperated Zemancheff has finally declared "enough", telling The Australian there are simply no plans by NSW to ditch Hickey, whose 68 per cent win ratio (13 wins from 19 matches) is the highest of any current Australian Super 14 coach. Indeed, it is even marginally better than Rod Macqueen's 66 per cent winning record at the Brumbies in 1996-97. Still, Ewen McKenzie averaged 69 per cent in the 2008 season in which he was dumped by NSW.


"It (sacking Hickey) is not even a blip on our radar," Zemancheff said. "It is just not happening. When the Waratahs run out for the opening game of next season -- which we hope will be against the Rebels at the Melbourne rectangular stadium for the Weary Dunlop Cup -- Chris Hickey will be the coach who sends them out.
"I've personally sat down with Chris, looked him straight in the eye and told him that a change of coach simply is not on our agenda. He has a three-year contract that goes through to the end of next year and we're honouring it. I cannot be any more emphatic than that."
Nor has the Waratahs board issued any directives to Hickey to get his team playing more entertaining rugby. "We let him do his job," Zemancheff said.
Hickey admitted the ongoing speculation affected him only in so much as it had the potential to destabilise his team. "On a personal level, if you think it's an informed point a critic is making you might pay some attention but most of the criticism is uninformed," Hickey said.
"I don't know where some of these things surface from. They seem to have a life of their own and people who think of themselves as powerbrokers run with them. Perception isn't reality."
Hickey said he took some comfort in the fact the vast majority of NSW players coming off contract had re-signed with the Waratahs. Indeed, the only player who is a confirmed loss to the Tahs is young prop Dan Palmer, who has moved to the Brumbies.
"At a time when another team is aggressively in the marketplace trying to recruit players, the fact that so many of our players have re-signed is a real vote of confidence," Hickey said.
He dismissed the suggestion that selections for tomorrow night's home game against the Blues, in particular the substitution of exciting young centre Rob Horne for battering ram Tom Carter, had been influenced by criticism of the team's laboured form. "That just doesn't come on to the table at all," he said.


http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news...-1225845519049