It's confirmed... Kidney and Kiss reunite at London Irish
Premiership strugglers London Irish have pulled off a major coup by reuniting Declan Kidney and Les Kiss as part of a coaching overhaul.
Kidney joins as technical consultant, while Kiss is appointed as head coach in a move that sees technical director Brendan Venter leave the club with immediate effect.
Former Munster coach Kidney has an impressive CV, having twice led the province to European Champions Cup glory, before taking over as Ireland head coach in 2008.
He led his country to a Six Nations Grand Slam in 2009, ending a 61-year wait, and did so with Kiss as part of his coaching team.
Australian Kiss remained in Ireland's set-up following Kidney's departure in 2013 and was part of the coaching staff that helped Joe Schmidt's men to back-to-back Six Nations titles in 2014 and 2015.
The duo have signed three-year contracts with Irish, which will remain the case regardless of what league they are in next season.
Irish look certain to be relegated from the Premiership having won just two of 17 matches this season, and are 12 points adrift of nearest rivals Worcester Warriors.
"I'm under no illusions that this is going to be a challenging job," Kidney told the club's official website.
"English club rugby is very competitive, and it is going to take several years for us to cement a place at the top end of the Premiership, but I believe that with the right structures this becomes a realistic ambition for us.
"I'm particularly excited to be working with Les Kiss again. We had a great relationship with the Ireland national team and I know that he is the right person to join me on this journey. We can't wait to get started."
Kiss added: "Declan is a great person to work with, and I'm looking forward to joining him at London Irish. It is a big job for us, but one we are relishing."
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I like Andy’s critical approach to all hot issues especially when it comes to the rugby big “bosses”. However, sorry Andy, I don’t support your “we shouldn’t be questioning the integrity of Karl Dickson or any other official”. May I ask why? They do have a lot of responsibility, but they are people like us with all their sins and weaknesses. We have to respect their decision during the games, but why they became untouchable afterwards and people cannot even criticize them and the ones, who does express their concerns, got punished for publicly analyzing their mistakes and asking questions. If they believe they did right, there shouldn’t be a problem for any of the refs to answer these “questions” publicly. I don’t really remember such cases. However, I do remember how Craig Joubert shown his running skills in 2015 or Pascal Gauzere shined in Cardiff in 2021. I do believe that Rassie, as anybody else, had a full right to share his vision of Nic Berry’s performance the same year. I do not support the hate in any form especially in public one, but creating the cast of untouchable refs and rugby bosses is not for me. As for Karl, he had all means to question his appointment for the game and since I don’t now whether he did it, blaming just RFU wouldn’t be quite correct at this moment. I love the game of rugby and almost every time I watch it I don’t support any team, I just wanna see the good game and fair referring. Sorry, Karl. last Saturday you got my Craig Joubert”s award of the round. It is up to Karl to prove that I am wrong, not to Andy or RFU’s corporate bla-bla-bla. Something like that…
Go to commentswell remember the blues had a guy called jed rowlands for a season. remember scott took his coaching team with him give him time
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