Mike Ford (rugby)
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Mike A. Ford (born 18 November 1965) is an English former rugby league player and current rugby union coach. He is the England national rugby union team's defence coach.
Born in Oldham, Lancashire, Ford played rugby league as a scrum half, playing for Wigan, Leigh, Wakefield Trinity, Castleford, South Queensland Crushers and Oldham. He won 10 caps for Great Britain.
He retired in 2001 as player-coach of Oldham RLFC after guiding them to the championship Grand Final. Whilst at Oldham, he started coaching rugby union at Dukinfield RUFC for 5 seasons winning a cup and two promotions. He left Oldham RLFC to take over as Defensive Co-ordinator of Ireland in January 2002 and stayed for 4 seasons winning a triple crown and guiding Ireland to 3rd in the world rankings. In September 2004 he started working as a defence and skills coach at Saracens F.C., before taking over as head coach in August 2005.
He served as a defence coach on the 2005 British and Irish Lions tour to New Zealand, and left his position with Ireland in September 2005. He became defence coach of England May 2006.
He was part of the coaching team that was derided by the senior players in the 2007 RWC [1] and, after a record 0-36 loss to South Africa in the pool match, the players had a series of three meetings whereby they decided to ignore the disjointed coaching team and instead conducted their own strategies on how to play the knock-out games. The transformation was remarkable, after conceding 7 tries in the pool stages using Ford's defence strategies, the team only conceded 1 try against Australia, France and South Africa in the knock out stages.
The England playing record since Mike Ford became the defence coach is;
Played 58, Won 27, Lost 30, Drawn 1, Against 3N, Played 22, Won 4, Lost 18 Against all comers an average of 22 points conceded per game, against 3N, 31 points per game
Least points conceded in 2009 Six Nations (70) and least tries conceded in the 2010 Six Nations (5)
Ford is a Tigers Hall Of Fame Inductee.[2]
Two of his sons currently play rugby union, George Ford plays for Leicester Tigers and Joe Ford for Northampton Saints.
References
- ^ "The Telegraph, 26 Oct 2007". Telegraph. 2007-10-26. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
- ^ "Hall of Fame at castigers.com". castigers. 2008-12-31. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
External links
- 1965 births
- People from Oldham
- English rugby league players
- Wigan Warriors players
- Leigh Centurions players
- Wakefield Trinity Wildcats players
- Castleford Tigers players
- South Queensland Crushers players
- England national rugby league team players
- Great Britain national rugby league team players
- Oldham Roughyeds players
- English rugby union coaches
- Living people