Stuart Lancaster resigns: England in search of ‘experience’ following coach's departure

RFU wants coach with ‘proven international’ record and will move ‘without financial inhibition’ to secure one after abject World Cup

Stuart Lancaster during England’s catastrophic World Cup campaign, which cost the head coach his job (Reuters)

Ian Ritchie, the Rugby Football Union’s chief executive, pinned his professional future to the fortunes of the next England head coach as he announced the severing of ties with the home-grown Stuart Lancaster after seven years of full-time employment at Twickenham, the last four of them in charge of the national team. Lancaster’s successor is odds-on to be a foreigner, given the newly upgraded terms of reference demanding “proven international experience”.

Ritchie took no retrospective responsibility for Lancaster overseeing England’s elimination at the pool stage of their own World Cup last month, despite saying before the tournament that he would do exactly that. Instead the former All England Tennis Club head claimed he would lead the search for Lancaster’s successor “without financial inhibition”.

Ritchie may not have far to look, in one sense. He offered no names, but among those touted elsewhere Michael Cheika, the Australia coach, is coming to London on Sunday for a week’s stint looking after the Barbarians, and Jake White, once of South Africa, now with the French club Montpellier, is on Ritchie’s very Twickenham doorstep on Thursday for a European match at Harlequins.

Wales’ Kiwi coach Warren Gatland is holidaying in New Zealand, and Eddie Jones, latterly with Japan, is due at a press conference with his new team, the Stormers, in Cape Town.

When the RFU chairman, Bill Beaumont, appeared alongside Ritchie at a Twickenham stripped of the colourful banners that garlanded the stadium during the World Cup, they delivered black news involving one man only. Ritchie said he had met Lancaster for “several hours” on Monday, and spoken to him again on Tuesday, to discuss the RFU’s World Cup review of “almost 100 pieces of information” drawn from 59 people, including any England player who cared to take part and all 12 Premiership coaches.

The conclusion was that the end had come for the Cumbrian, who joined the RFU in May 2008 to look after player development and then the second-string Saxons team, became interim England head coach in succession to Martin Johnson after the ill-fated World Cup in autumn 2011, and was permanently appointed after the 2012 Six Nations.

The RFU board discussed keeping Lancaster, who signed a contract extension to 2020 last year – with break clauses allowing a pay-off of a shorter term by mutual consent – in his role as director of international performance but decided a “clean break” was best.

“We are looking for a head coach of proven international experience,” said Ritchie, and if that equates to having taken charge of a Test team, while not reverting to a previous incumbent such as Sir Clive Woodward, it ruled out any fresh English candidates such as Rob Baxter or Jim Mallinder. “It’s not a matter of financial considerations. It is a very attractive job, still one of the biggest in world coaching.

“The nationality is not important. Getting the right coach is. There won’t be a specified advisory group; I will talk to people throughout the game as I feel necessary. This is my responsibility and it’ll be my recommendation. I have been thinking of a shortlist, but have I spoken to anyone yet? Absolutely not.”

No decision was taken regarding Lancaster’s lieutenants, Andy Farrell, Graham Rowntree and Mike Catt, and Ritchie said in theory they could be caretakers for the 2016 Six Nations that kicks off for England in Scotland in early February. But the incomer will have free rein to appoint whomever he sees fit, and the trio must be considered dead men walking by association.

Lancaster made his farewells by way of an RFU media release: “I am obviously extremely saddened to finish the way we did in this World Cup and to step down from the role. The reality is that, while many aspects of the review were very positive, we didn’t achieve success on the field when it mattered and we all have to take responsibility for that, but me especially as head coach. I am immensely proud of the development of this team and I know that there is an incredibly strong foundation for them to progress to great things in the future.”

Ritchie reacted to the England full-back Mike Brown’s gripes over a lack of trust in the squad by saying the new coach would “need to get everybody on the same page when the next training camp assembles”, while the chief executive dismissed the Sam Burgess affair as “not in any way embarrassing for the RFU. There was no insistence on the RFU’s part that he had to be picked.”