London Irish shaken but stirred

"This is a potentially big club, but one in seemingly permanent disarray and disunity," went one of the descriptions of Manchester City after the latest episode in their managerial revolving door this week. The same description might just as readily be applied to London Irish, which throughout the 1990s has become a byword for instability. And now they're at it again.

Following the changes in ownership and at boardroom level last season, and at chief executive level this season, the turnover in coaches reached the ridiculous heights of eight in six years with Willie Anderson's removal and the arrival of Dick Best this week.

Even the boardroom wasn't unanimous about this, for some players have been told by board members that the none-too-secret interview with Bob Dwyer on Wednesday was conducted by board member Patrick Kiely and chief executive Chuck Nelson at the behest of chairman Geoff Read, unbeknownst to other board members. Indeed, John Stacpoole, another leading light in the consortium behind London Irish Holdings Ltd, apparently belongs in the pro-Anderson faction.

There is at least unanimity in the dressing room, but only in so far as they believe that Anderson was shabbily and harshly treated. "We had a private meeting on Wednesday and discussed ways of making our feelings known to the board," one player revealed yesterday.

But by the time the players' representatives got to Sunbury on Thursday, the deed had been done and no meeting took place. "We were powerless to do anything about it," he said. "Some of us felt bad, in that the performances and the results got Willie the sack. But he didn't have a strong enough squad at the start of the season. Now, just when he had strengthened it and we were starting to turn the corner, they go and get rid of him."

To say that the players have ambiguous views about Best, the former English coach who was removed from Harlequins last season at the behest of the players, would be an understatement. Some of Best's comments in his guise as either English or Harlequins coach have been interpreted as derogatory toward Irish rugby.

Ironically, this included a suggestion that the Exiles - i.e., Londons Irish, Scottish and Welsh - should be removed from the top flight of English club rugby. Thus, at the squad's first meeting with their new coach on Thursday, Jeremy Davidson asked Best what he thought of Irish people. Best, reportedly, laughed it off, saying: "I change my mind every day."

Nevertheless, most of the players, and perhaps all, appear to have a clear perception of why Best was brought in. "The way we're reading it, he's been brought in for three months to be the hatchet man. They (the board) saw Willie as too close to the players. "Most players' contracts are up at the end of the season. That's the biggest joke. None of us, except the new signings this season, have actually signed contracts." Only heads of agreement are in place, despite Anderson renegotiating contracts with all of them this season following the club's change in ownership.

So now, the dressing room is complete with players whose loyalty was to the sacked coach, who have ambivalent views about his replacement and who have little or no job security. Perhaps this is what some of the board wanted, in the belief that it would gee them up.

Clearly, they were intent on removing Anderson before the end of the season anyway, despite being only 14 months in the job and having been unable, until recently, to strengthen a squad that struggled to avoid relegation last season and was always going to again this season, given that money-rich Newcastle and Richmond had replaced the financial lightweights of West Hartlepool and Orrell.

The board had already spoken to Best last week, but when Bob Dwyer was sacked by Leicester on Tuesday, Read and O'Driscoll, moving with remarkable speed, interviewed the ex-Australian coach on Wednesday. Anderson had learnt of this second-hand that night, in a phone call from a journalist. He rang Dwyer to have the news confirmed and then informed his players on Wednesday. Ironically, he had been due to continue negotiations for a new, two-year contract the next day, so he could move his family over.

Anderson, publicly at any rate, holds no grudges. "This is business now. I've taken a lot from it, no bitterness, no whingeing," he says. "I walk away with my head held up high. I felt I was doing something right, but now it doesn't matter. It's not a nice thing to be sacked, but I enjoyed 125 per cent support from the players, and 27 of them took me for a drink before I left."

There may well be a seventh coach in nine years come next season, with a grandiose, world-wide search for a successor to Best and idle rumours of Sean Fitzpatrick coming as a player-coach, rumours founded, perhaps in part, by talks over the last few months with Norm Hewitt. But they can only play two non-EU players at any one time.

All the while, London Irish's very Irishness seems to be diminishing by the day. As what seemed a particularly mournful rendition of The Fields of Athenry was played on the p.a. system last night, one club member said: "Pretty soon, all that will be left will be the name."

The abiding impression is of a decision made by men in suits, suffering from premature ambition - "We want to win the European Cup" - and of a clash in personalities between Anderson and Read. Yet the one thing London Irish desperately needs above all else is a period of stability and togetherness. But that's the one thing that can't be bought, even in the professional era.