On this day: Leicester sack head coach Marcelo Loffreda after one season
Leicester Tigers sacked head coach Marcelo Loffreda after only one season in charge at the Premiership club on this day in 2008.
Loffreda arrived at Welford Road three months into the season after he led Argentina to the World Cup semi-finals in 2007.
Things did not quite go to plan for him during the campaign as Leicester failed to defend their title.
The Tigers were also surprisingly dumped out of the Heineken Cup group stages before losing to the Ospreys in the final of the EDF Energy Cup.
They won 13 of their 22 games which earned them a fourth-place finish in the Premiership but came up short in another final after they suffered a 26-16 defeat at the hands of Wasps in the play-offs.
Loffreda was sacked less than eight months into his role, after losing nine league games and a failure to win any trophies.
After he was sacked by the club, Loffreda said: “I was disappointed, because I didn’t have enough time to learn and adjust. Leicester have very high expectations and are always in a rush to win trophies.”
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Skelton may be brought back for the Wallabies so that would be the only reason that may hinder Wilson. Easily the form, most skilful and game IQ of any Oz 8. Valentini’s best and favourite position is 6, but lineouts may be an issue with Skelton, Valentini and Wilson. Will be interesting what Schmidt goes for but for me Wilson should be picked on form. Schmidt rewards work rate, skill and consistency. All that glitters every so often won’t be in contention. Greely is one of those players that has a knack of making the right decision. A coach is going to love him because he knows week in week out he’s going to get the job done. The second try Greely wasn’t the guy who made the initial break it was Flook, Greely was at the bottom of the ruck when Flook was off along the sideline. Greely got up and made the effort to catch up with play but also read the play nicely and hit the pass from Campbell at pace and then held the pass beautifully to Ryan.
Go to commentsSharks deserved to be far further back by the last quarter. Their tackling was awful, their set pieces were disappointing, their defensive organization was poor (especially on the Kok side of the D line), they kept making unnecessary errors, and they never looked like cracking the Clermont defense during those first 60m. Masuku kept them in touch, with some help from the Clermont generosity on penalty opportunities. Agree with the writer of this article. It was belligerence, and ability to raise their pressure game just enough, that turned the last quarter into a Bok-style shutout. Clermont have a reputation of not playing the full 80m, and there was a bit of that for sure. But, quite often when the intensity of a team drops off in the last quarter credit is due to the opponent for tiring them out. At 60m, with the Kok try, you thought that just maybe the game was on. At 70m, with the Mapimpi contribution, one felt that Clermont were fading, while facing a team that would maintain the pressure game through the final whistle. Good win in the end, but the Sharks are still playing way below their potential. And with their resources, and a coach that has had enough time to figure things out, they are running out of excuses.
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