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Head coach Cooper to leave Stade Francais
By Peter Thompson
Greg Cooper will step down as Stade Francais head coach after the Top 14 clash with Pau due to personal reasons.
The former All Black only stepped up from his position as backs coach to succeed Gonzalo Quesada at the end of last season, but has now expressed his desire to leave the Paris club.
Olivier Azam and Julien Dupuy will take charge of Stade side that has endured a miserable campaign in the French top flight and is battling to qualify for the European Challenge Cup quarter-finals.
The club said in a statement: "Stade Francais Paris would like to thank Greg very much for his investment since his arrival in Paris, and even more so since the return to the club by [owner] Dr. Hans Peter Wild.
"His integrity, his human and sports qualities were appreciated by all. We wish him the best for the future, both professionally and personally."
Cooper coached Super Rugby franchise Highlanders from 2003 to 2007 before taking the role as Blues assistant and departed his homeland to work in Japan prior to heading to France.
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Latest Comments
I was at this match. Jordie Barrett earned his money with a massive hit to slow a connaught attack to win the math when Leinster had 14 in the last few mins. Mack Hansen had a real go at the refereeing after citing a serious head hits on Iaone and Aki.
connaught were up for this. Snyman tried a trademark dirty after, and the onnaught 4 and the onnaught pack absolutely laid into him.
Leinster hose to kick to the corner when only winning by 5 with 10 left and qith only 2 tries scored. onnaught should have punisihed them for that utter stupidity after they broke out and Leinster yellowed to stop the attack.
13 changes from last week. It seems teams are scoring about 10 points less against Leinster this year. With Neinaber in his second year, the new attack coah established, surely they will be a bigger threat in champions up? Or will the attack recgress further.
They must adopt the SA philosophy of take your 3 pointers and the bonus points will come.
connaught back line inluding Iaone, Murphy, Aki, Forde, cordero is the seond best in Ireland surely. Leinster were lucky here
Go to commentsShould have played more for England but he jumped ship just as he was breaking through.
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