The real Geoff Parling: How new Leicester Tigers head coach will bring back the glory days

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It was in the town of Oadby where Geoff Parling first struck up his love affair with Leicester Tigers.

The year was 2009 and Parling, who was a fresh-faced lock for Newcastle at the time, had been invited down by the club's then director of rugby Richard Cockerill.

The conversation between player and coach was as simple as this.

Cockerill: ‘Do you want to sign for us?’ Parling: ‘Yep.’

He was announced as a double signing with Anthony Allen, helping the club win the Premiership in his very first season.

‘When I signed Geoff, he was sat on the bench at Newcastle,’ Cockerill told Rugby Confidential.

Geoff Parling is back at Leicester, the club he played for from 2009 to 2015, as head coach

He was a lineout menace for the Tigers and won the Premiership title in 2010 and 2013 

Parling went on to play 29 times for England and in all three Tests on the 2013 Lions tour of Australia

‘We met, I told him I wanted to sign him and he said: “Yep”. It was that easy. It was a lot harder to keep holder of him once he was a British and Irish Lion!

‘Did I see him becoming director of rugby one day? Probably not! You don’t know at that stage. I saw a lot of potential in him as a player, especially as a lineout forward, and he turned out to be great for Leicester.

‘The thing with Geoff is that he got every ounce of ability out of himself. He’s got a body like a sack of spuds. He really worked hard physically to get everything out of himself.

'As a player, he worked hard. He knows what he’s good at and he knows what he’s not good at. He’s got all the ingredients, so I think it’s a shrewd bit of business by the club.’

Coaching always piqued Parling’s interest. He helped out with students at Newcastle before he signed for Leicester and lent a hand with Taunton in National League One when he signed for Exeter in 2015.

He moved to Japan as a player-coach with the Munakata Sanix Blues in 2017, but it was with the Melbourne Rebels and the Wallabies where he started to establish himself.

Even living in Australia, Parling kept his Leicester connections close. He came back home to go to Twickenham to watch them beat Saracens in the Premiership final in 2022, sitting beside his former team-mate Tom Croft.

When Tigers head coach Michael Cheika announced he was leaving the club this summer after just one season in charge, Parling was not the first name on the club’s shortlist. He has never worked as a head coach, but the club hope he will compensate for a shortage of experience in other areas.

Parling has been an assistant coach at Melbourne Rebels since 2018

He has also been a coach with Australia since 2020, helping them to a shock win at Twickenham last November

Parling lifted the Premiership title with Leicester in his first season, beating Saracens in the final

Richard Cockerill was Parling's director of rugby at Leicester for six years

Rugby Confidential understands Parling initiated the conversations with the club and the deal was quickly pushed through over the last week or two. He has been given license to build his own team of assistant coaches, with work already underway.

‘I don’t think there’s too much of a risk about him not being a head coach before,’ said Cockerill. ‘He’s worked in a lot of different environments and he’s clearly been in a good one with Joe Schmidt in Australia. It’s important Leicester have someone who know what Leicester is about and Geoff does.

‘When I left the club, they wanted to go in a different direction of how they wanted to play under Aaron Mauger. It got them into trouble, didn’t it? Big trouble. They brought Steve Borthwick in who went back to the basics of defence, set piece, being hard to beat and they won the Premiership.

‘Leicester’s a working-class place. The rugby’s about proud people who love the club. It’s not a place for selfish people. There’s a bit of stardust in there. There always has been with foreign players, but essentially there’s no egos and you get on with it.

'Geoff understands that and he’s been part of that. Geoff is from Stockton-on-Tees up north. He fits into that environment.

'Leicester play a certain way. Obviously you have to score tries, but ultimately you have to be f***ing tough. The Leicester teams that have been tough are the ones that have been successful.’

Cockerill's vote for new Tigers 10 

Now Leicester have sorted out their new coach, they face the difficult challenge of recruiting a world-class No 10 to replace South African Handre Pollard.

Options are few and far between but Cockerill, who now coaches Georgia, has recommended the Lelos’ fly-half.

Cockerill believes his Georgia No 10 Luka Matkava can be Leicester's next fly-half

Matkava plays for Castres in Top14, on loan from Cockerill's Black Lion club side

‘Which 10s are on the market that are going to be as good as Handre Pollard? It’s difficult, isn’t it,' said Cockerill. 'We’ve got a very good Georgian 10 who is currently at Castres - Luka Matkava. He would do a very good job.

'Whoever Tigers sign at 10 is going to have to be a statement signing. They’re losing a world class player, but Leicester are a world-class club – they have gravitas, they have money and they should be able to attract the right person.’ 

Burns to Bucharest? 

Former Tigers and England fly-half Freddie Burns is weighing up the most surprising move of his career yet after being sounded out by Bucharest-based side Romanian Wolves.

The globe-trotting No 10, who kicked the winning drop-goal when Leicester won the Premiership in 2022, has already enjoyed stints with the Highlanders in New Zealand and the Shoki Shuttles in Japan.

He is the Japanese league’s leading points scorer this season, but is out of contract in the summer.

The Wolves, Romania’s main professional club, play in the Rugby Europe Super Cup alongside the likes of another Cockerill side - Georgia's Black Lion team - and the move may well appeal to Burns’ adventurous personality.

No sign of stopping for Halfpenny 

Leigh Halfpenny is set to put aside coaching interest from the Welsh Rugby Union to continue his professional playing career into an 18th year in France.

Wales great Halfpenny, the third-highest points scorer in the country’s history, retired from Test rugby in November 2023.

Leigh Halfpenny is set to reject a move into coaching with Wales and leave Harlequins for French second division side Beziers

Wales great Halfpenny, the third-highest points scorer in the country’s history, retired from Test rugby in November 2023

The WRU have been interested in hiring the Harlequins full back in a potential kicking coach role, but Rugby Confidential understands such a position would only be part-time. With that in mind, the now 36-year-old looks set to sign for French second division side Beziers on the south coast.

Another exit at Gloucester 

Fiji No 8 Albert Tuisue will continue the Gloucester exodus to France after signing for Provence.

The Cherry & Whites this week confirmed the departure of a mammoth 19 players, with forgotten England back row Zach Mercer and Wales fly-half Gareth Anscombe moving to Top14 sides Toulon and Bayonne respectively.

Gloucester’s Scotland international centre Chris Harris is also leaving and is understood to be under consideration by Bath as an injury dispensation signing.