Golf clubs and smashed mirrors, dog tags and Tigers flags. Michael Cheika has used elaborate, and sometimes wacky, tactics to spur his teams on – but the message has always been simple.
“I just think people think about things too much,” the Leicester Tigers head coach told BBC Sport about the method behind his famous use of imagery to motivate players.
“And often when you think about things, it stops you from doing it.”
It was before a Super Rugby final that Cheika presented his New South Wales Waratahs players with personally engraved drivers. His message then was to “have a big swing at it”.
Then when at the helm of the Australia national team, he issued players with dog tags before the 2015 World Cup to unify them as a battalion. It was in that same tournament that he used a sledgehammer to smash a mirror, external in the changing room before the final to show what he physically demanded of his side.
There is a tale behind every bit of symbolism.
What the story is at Leicester Tigers as they prepare for Saturday’s Premiership semi-final against Sale Sharks, he will not tell.
“That is something for us,” said the relaxed Australian with a broad grin, while leaning on a pitchside railing at Mattioli Woods Welford Road in a pair of retro sliders he picked up in the 1980s.
“All that stuff is designed to get the team aligned and around certain themes we want to push. And we try do that all year.
“You just go with instincts on those things. There is no science behind that stuff. You try read the room as best you can. That golf club thing was a last-day decision, it wasn’t like it was planned.
“They might start off like fun or jokes or whatever, but then they can turn into something that is serious or something that is meaningful because they symbolise something.
“Those moments we share together as a team, across all teams that I have been involved in, are really important. They are the things that hold you together when you are a man down or you are under the pump.”
