RUGBY: Still reeling a little from the news that Matt Williams has decided to decamp to Scotland and succeed Ian McGeechan as head coach, the Leinster Branch chief executive, Mick Dawson, last night gave the province eight weeks to find a successor to the Australian. Gerry Thornley reports

A host of names will inevitably be bandied about, but it was clear that Leinster are very much on the starting blocks with a view to finding a new director of rugby.

"There is no agenda, we don't have any names in the hat," conceded Dawson. "We will be advertising for a top-quality coach of proven ability for what we believe is a top-quality team, and no doubt agents will put forward names, as some have already done so from England."

Willie Anderson, Williams' assistant for the past season and likely to be a leading contender for the job, will assume as caretaker of what is a skeletal squad, given Leinster's frontliners are in Australia with the Ireland squad.

But Dawson intimated that a Southern Hemisphere appointment is likely, and others who may come into the reckoning are Ballymena's AIL-winning Australian coach and Irish scrumagging coach Tony D'Arcy; Clontarf's Phil Werahiko; John Connolly, recently let go by Swansea and perennially linked with Irish posts; ex-Italian coach Brad Johnstone; and Tim Lane, another upwardly mobile and highly thought of Aussie who had been with Montferrand and is now in South Africa.

Dawson admitted that a Southern Hemisphere coach is "a distinct possibility".

Relocating Alan Gaffney from Munster to Leinster and Michael Bradley from Connacht to Munster has a certain symmetry to it, but it is probably too soon in Bradley's cv, while relocating Alan Solomons from Ulster would merely create another problem for the IRFU in Ulster.

Dawson confirmed he had only been made aware of the position on Saturday and Sunday, though the sense of urgency is eased by Leinster having already signed 32 of their 34 contracts for next season, and are merely on the lookout for a third scrumhalf and another prop.

With the Scots touring South Africa, Williams was airborne en route to Durban, where he will be unveiled today, and was unavailable for comment last night.

His agent, John Baker, commented: "Obviously events did move very rapidly over the weekend. It had been Matt's intention to stay with Leinster for the remainder of his contract, and he would have done so had he not been offered a position as a coach to a national team."

Inevitably, there will be speculation that a slight souring of his relationship with both the Leinster players and the media in the fall-out from the European Cup semi-final defeat to Perpignan contributed to Williams' departure, but in the heel of the hunt that had little or nothing to do with it.

The key was simply the chance to coach a national side, and with Australia and Ireland probably out of reach, Williams, at 43, reasoned that he may never have such an opportunity again.

Furthermore, it is believed that Williams has been offered a four-year contract, up to the 2007 World Cup in France, to succeed McGeechan as head coach, with the latter succeeding Jim Telfer as Scotland's director of rugby. As his six months' notice has been accepted immediately by the IRFU, Williams should be brought under the Scottish umbrella well before the World Cup.

Williams' legacy? As Dawson commented last night: "He brought a level of professionalism to the whole set up which probably hadn't been there before. Under him Leinster's win ratio was close to 95 per cent and Leinster played a brand of rugby which people were banging down the doors at Donnybrook to see. He did a lot of good and we wish him the best of luck."

When he first arrived three seasons ago as number two to Mike Ruddock, Leinster's back play became more inventive and potent. As head coach, his standards of professionalism demanded and extracted more from players whose careers either took off or were, in many cases, reborn. He was renowned for implementing a defensive system, and he also helped revive the coaching careers of Roly Meates and Anderson, and he introduced Alan Gaffney to Irish rugby, not to mention Keith Gleeson.

In Williams' three seasons Leinster won 32, drew three and lost 12, and their support base improved immeasurably also. To a degree, he and his team then became a victim of their own success. A review of Leinster's seven successive wins in Europe may suggest they didn't beat all that much, but those back-to-back wins over Montferrand were epic, and assuredly broke the back of the latter's season.

Yet the nature of the defeat to Perpignan highlighted the degree to which he became sidetracked by his and Leinster's standing in the media; the disharmony in the camp also suggested he placed undue emphasis on the starting XV (even to the point of reluctantly making replacements). Ultimately, alas, his tenure has a slightly unfulfilled look.

It will be intriguing to see how he gets on in Scotland, where the Aussie influence is already manifest in the presence of fitness coach Marty Hulme (best man at Williams' wedding), kicking coach Mike Byrne and three of the Scottish squad: Robbie Russell, Andy Mower and Nathan Hines.