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Michael Cheika reveals receiving fan threats during Israel Folau saga
By Online Editors
Wallabies head coach Michael Cheika has revealed receiving personal threats from fans after he ruled out selecting controversial former star Israel Folau in the wake of his anti-gay social media stance.
Folau had has multi-million dollar contract terminated by Rugby Australia earlier this year after posting multiple graphics to Instagram which warned homosexuals among other "sinners" where going to hell.
Cheika had last year helped soothe the feud between Folau and Rugby Australia but when the former fullback continued his ways online, Cheika made clear he couldn't select him again - and it didn't go down well with some Wallabies fans.
"People were saying all sorts of stuff," Cheika said. "Just threats I was getting; people on the street, some to my face, a couple at some games. It was just crazy stuff."
Making clear he was not disappointed in Folau's actions specifically, Cheika said it was a shame Australia had lost such a player in a World Cup year.
"If that's what he believes, and that's where his passion is, I will never tell someone to hide it, Cheika said. "I might not agree with everyone, but I'd never want someone to not say what they feel. I'm no person to judge.
"The other disappointing part is that we lost one of our best players; a guy who I helped come back. I wouldn't say I'm responsible for what's happened. It's just life. But I had to do what was needed for the team."
Also noting that rumours of the Folau saga dividing the current Wallabies team were far from the truth, Cheika said any concerns were quickly put to rest in team meetings.
"There was an inference of some type of split – that's so untrue," he said. "We had to make some hard decisions.
"But [claims of a split] was the opposite of the truth. And that's the fundamental thing about great teams: they trust each other, they're united when it's really tough.
"And I think it's shown to be a total untruth with the way this team has played this season. It's been disproved by the spirit and team camaraderie that's been shown."
Folau is currently suing Rugby Australia for as much as $A10 million for unlawful dismissal and restraint of trade.
The matter is set down for February in the Federal Circuit Court.
This article first appeared on nzherald.co.nz and was republished with permission.
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URC us doing very well with it’s competitiveness given that each group has it’s own salary caps and entirely different makeups, from clubs, to provinces, to franchises and regions. One group might be teams from the most populace country with the biggest rugby base while another the smallest, with the least amount of rugby players to chose from.
I would also be interested in a average clock length (don’t need to go into the whole BIP hole) showing how long the last phases are taking (because one team is trying to still alter the match points outcome in some way) to complete before the game finally ends. I don’t know if its more common this year but in general I wonder if its a stat that can show how good games are/were?
You really had the same reversed 10 points lead % as you had lead changes after the 75th?
Some of these values while standing out numerically against each other have a much less correlative impact than some that tighter differences which might only stick out a small amount. While SRP’s ones might not necessarily be such examples (and here I’m still going off the basic principle that everyone knew this was happening, even though I was challenged about that assumption) they have had the advantage of the fixtures being were doctored even more than normal. In this instance its irrelevant whether they were doctored or not of course, but I think it’s pretty safe to say that there hasn’t been a lot of cross over of worst v best yet. Maybe it just feels like that because the worst are so much better this year? I definitely think that it is undeniable that all the bottom teams (that remain) have gotten better.
So I would be very interested in another weight graph of the games still, but regardless I don’t think it’s fair for SRP to claim anything over the other leagues yet. Certainly as I have said numerous times about the Top 14, it’s sub par compared to what it’s billed up to be, but that is the only league in this group that has promotion and relegation, which is the antitheses of a competitive league, so a trade off there.
Thank you very much for sharing your research though Dmitri, I hope you find another topic to get interested about!
Go to commentsI can’t believe Rugby Australia thought the NZRU would accept 1-12 split. I’m sure if the split was more even then the NZRU would’ve made it work.
It’s even worse when the NZRU relatively recently gave Rugby Australia a bigger cut of the Super Rugby broadcast.
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