Michael Cheika announced as head coach of Leicester Tigers

eicester Tigers are pleased to confirm the appointment of Michael Cheika as the club’s new Head Coach ahead of the 2024/25 season.

He joins Tigers after a two-year stint as Head Coach of Los Pumas, the Argentina national men’s team, who he led to fourth place at the 2023 Rugby World Cup.

A European Cup and Celtic League winner with Leinster and Super Rugby winner with the NSW Waratahs, Cheika has also coached at three Rugby World Cups – Argentina in 2023 and reaching the final with Australia in 2015 and quarter finals in 2019 – as well as one Rugby League World Cup with Lebanon.

On the appointment of Cheika, Leicester Tigers CEO Andrea Pinchen said: “We are very pleased to be able to appoint someone of Michael’s experience and history with success to the role of Head Coach."

“He has, over more than two decades, achieved great success in winning trophies but also developing players, developing coaches and galvanising groups to be the best they can be.

“We want that, we need that and believe Michael is the right person to take this team, this club back to where we know we should be.

“I also accept that the past week is not what fans expected, and nor did we, but the decisions we have made are for the long-term benefit of Leicester Tigers and after lengthy, detailed and very honest conversations with Michael in recent days, we are on the same page about what is now necessary to see this club back on top.”

On his appointment, Cheika said: “Honestly, I wasn’t looking at the Premiership and didn’t have the desire to coach in it until Leicester Tigers came to me. But, the opportunity to coach at Tigers and lead this group of players turned my head.”

“I want this to be my best coaching yet. I want the preparation and the way we lead the team, to be at my best level. If I can bring my best level, other people will bring their best level and good things will start to happen around us.

“Everybody can see that it is a top-quality roster the club has. I am not going to lie and say I know every single one of them down to their bones but that’s what I will do over the next few months, to learn how to get the best out of them.

“But, the roster is only paper. It’s now about how the team gels, how to put these really good players and characters together and get them playing in a way that they love it and a way they love going out there, together, and representing Leicester Tigers.

Cheika’s appointment is effective immediately and the new Head Coach will be present for day one of the 24/25 pre-season programme on Monday, July 1.

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MICHAEL CHEIKA:

Michael Cheika played his senior rugby with Randwick, in Sydney’s club competition, who he made almost 300 appearances for in two stints over ten years.

Following his first five years with Randwick, in 1989, Cheika joined Castres in France for two seasons before spending a season with CASG Paris, who later merged with Stade Francais.

In 1992, he made the move to Italian club Livorno for two seasons before returning to Randwick, where he spent five years before retiring from playing in 1999.

While with Randwick he also represented Australia Under-21s and New South Wales.

After finishing playing, Cheika moved into coaching with his first lead appointment at Petrarca Padova in Italy, on the recommendation of David Campese, where he spent two seasons in charge.

While with Petrarca, he led the Italian side through one of only two Champions Cup campaigns in the club’s history.

In 2001, he returned to Sydney to take charge of Randwick in the Shute Shield where he won the highly coveted Sydney competition in 2004 before being headhunted to take over Leinster in 2005.

During five years with Leinster, where he remains second for all-time games as Head Coach, Cheika won the 2007/08 Celtic League and 2008/09 Champions Cup. He left Ireland for France in 2010, to lead Stade Francais, where he reached the Challenge Cup Final in his first season before a semi-final finish in his final season in Paris.

He returned to Australia in 2013 to take up the Head Coach role with the NSW Waratahs and, in just his second season in charge, led the Sydney-based franchise to their first Super Rugby title with victory over the Crusaders in the 2014 final.

After being appointed the Wallabies coach at the end of 2014, Cheika coached the Waratahs in 2015 before taking over the Test role and – in his first full season at the helm of the national side – guided Australia to the 2015 Rugby World Cup Final.

He coached Australia in 68 Tests – the second most of any Wallabies coach since it became a full-time role in 1982 – in six years and finished his tenure with a quarter-final finish at the 2019 Rugby World Cup.

His former assistant coach with Australia, Mario Ledesma, recruited him to join the Los Pumas coaching staff in 2020 and, after Ledesma’s resignation in 2022, was then named as the first non-Argentinian Head Coach for almost 25 years.

While with Argentina, he was also Director of Rugby at NEC Green Rockets Tokatsu in Japan and – in rugby league – a member of the Sydney Roosters coaching team and Head Coach of the Lebanon Test team, which included the Middle Eastern nation’s best-ever placing as quarter finalists at the 2021 Rugby League World Cup, which was played in 2022.

Cheika left his role with Los Pumas at the conclusion of the 2023 Rugby World Cup, where Argentina finished in fourth place.