England Rugby appoint Ashton to head coach

In today’s announcement, fiendishly devised by [tag]Rob Andrew[/tag] and the [tag]English[/tag] [tag]Rugby Football Union[/tag] to cast doubt upon my rugby prediction skills, [tag]Brian Ashton[/tag] was promoted from Attack Coach to Head Coach of the England team.

Ashton has a lot of things going for him, but I don’t think he’s the right man for the job, this appointment smacks of desperation with the [tag]Rugby World Cup[/tag] happening next year.

Rob Andrew has no doubts about moving Ashton up:

Brian is the most experienced coach in [tag]England[/tag], he has enormous respect with the players and he has massive [tag]international[/tag] and club experience. This coaching team have only been together since May and I believe Brian is the right man to lead the coaches and players into a new period for English rugby starting with the [tag]Six Nations[/tag] opener against Scotland.

Jeff Probyn (former England prop) thinks Ashton’s appointment was a mistake.

It’s a short term stopgap and that’s not what England need, they need to put in place a structure that will take them forward for the next 10 years rather than taking a short-term view. The current thinking is obviously let’s appoint Brian, get through the [tag]World Cup[/tag] and then appoint someone else. Brian works well alongside others who make decisions. Coaching-wise he’s the man to take England forward. But as a head coach, decision-maker and planner of the broader vision to take England forward, he’s not the right man.

Exactly my thinking. Here’s some other commentry on Ashton as England boss:

Sir Clive Woodward:

Not that good in terms of winning [tag]international rugby[/tag] matches

Will Carling:

He’s a great coach but I think we need a manager

Donal Lenihan:

I have a huge amount of respect for Brian and I’m sure the England players will as well

Stuart Barnes, unfortunately worded:

England need a head coach who is not scared of losing and that man is Brian Ashton

And finally Ashton himself:

It’s a massive privilege. I recognise the challenges ahead of us and along with the other coaches in the team my focus now is to prepare England to play Scotland on February 3

Will he be successful? It’s hard to know what success is in terms of this team – beating Scotland, Italy and one other in the Six Nations would be a good start. One positive for him is that [tag]English rugby[/tag] can’t possibly get any worse.