Rob Andrew to leave Director of elite Rugby post
Rob Andrew has been scrapped from his post of Director of elite Rugby. He is now considering going for a new job at Rugby Football Union that resembles his current job description. John Steele, the new Rugby Football Union chief executive has looked into
the operations of the organization and is taking steps to strengthen the management structure of RFU. He has taken a bold step of merging the elite department with the union’s community rugby.
The latest rugby department is divided into different areas of performance, development and operations. Andrew is invited to be the director of the operations. This job description includes almost all the tasks that he used to do as an elite director.
Christopher Robert Andrew, a former English Rugby union footballer is nicknamed as ‘Squeaky’ in the world of Rugby. He is currently the Director of Elite Rugby and prior to that he was Director of Rugby for Newcastle Falcons.
In his career as a player he was trusted with his foot work and he assured his defensive and kicking skills are world class. The 5ft 9in fly half played for England and made his debut in January 1985 at Twickenham against Romania. He earned 70 caps for England
and captained two matches in his 10 year long career at the national team. Later on he signed a contract with Wasps and then he moved on to Newcastle Falcons.
His final appearance for England in 1997 was after a period of two years. He was called on the field to play against Wales at a try scoring position. Andrew scored a total of 396 international points. Andrew holds an honour of winning three grand slams for
England and a record of scoring the highest points in an international match. He scored 30 points against Canada in 1994. After this record, the critics blamed him for not relying on passing and kicking too much, but English audience thoroughly enjoyed his
presence on the field as number 10.
Not a very common knowledge but Andrew was a first class cricketer too. He played for a short interval for Cambridge and Combined University. He was a left hand batsman and also a right armed off break bowler.
He gave a few appearances for Yorkshire Second XI as well. Rob Andrew, who is credited for discovering Jonny Wilkinson is now at a decision making turn of his career in the world of Rugby.
Andrew expressed very diplomatically, “I am very excited about the future of the game in England, and the re-structuring that will place rugby at the heart of everything the RFU does.”
He further said that changes are never easy to accept, but when you see positive results generating, you should go for them.
He said, “I will be considering the role of rugby operations director in the coming weeks and in the meantime will continue with my responsibilities as elite rugby director.”
He was preferred to Sir Clive Woodward to join as a director in 2006 and he will remain at this post as long as Steele’s new hierarchy does not get implemented.
Steele’s reallocation of authorities and responsibilities will bring a totally new era of sports management. This means that Martin Johnson, the England team manager has to report to a new position i.e. performance director. Accordingly, Steele is also bringing
domestic community rugby in the central department for rugby, which will be managed by director of development.
Steele said in a press conference, “What became clear is that while we had a sound commercial platform we did not have enough focus on the quality of the rugby experience across the game.”
The new configuration will put rugby at the centre and all the other matters and business will revolve around it.
He added, “The next five years will be some of the most exciting in the RFU's history and I wanted to make sure we are in the right shape as organization to seize the opportunities in front of us.”
All these changes and restructuring are steps towards World Cup 2015 which will be held in England. Steele wants to ensure that England is ready for it when comes and wins on its home soil.
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