The sunny Welford Road stage was set for them to roll over Saracens, their old nemesis, and solidify a place in the Premiership play-off spots. But it disintegrated into a messy defeat.
Cheika joined Leicester as head coach last summer on a one-year deal with an option to extend – an option that won’t be enacted as the Australian says he prefers to return to the bosom of his family back home.
Leicester lost Steve Borthwick and his 2022 Premiership title-winning cohort of coaches to England, Dan McKellar had a short-lived stint, then it was Cheika.
As for the players, South Africa fly-half Handre Pollard is moving on this summer and it would be no surprise if fellow marquee star Julian Montoya, the Argentina hooker, does the same.
Springboks fly-half Handre Pollard is also leaving this summer (Photo: PA)The names tossed into the fly-half rumour mill have included England’s Owen Farrell, Ireland’s Jack Crowley and, seemingly more solidly, Gareth Anscombe – the 33-year-old Wales international who is out of contract at Gloucester this summer.
Pollard and Montoya were prominent with their individual talent in this match – the Springbok landing all but one of his goal kicks, and putting great energy into short carries, while the Puma was an utter menace with his nose for a turnover.
Looking across Welford Road from the dear old Crumbie Stand, a timeless tableau presented itself as folk shaded their eyes from the sun and watched the men in green, red and white hoops set up at the set-piece and prepare for the kill.
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But the kill very rarely came and Leicester suffered a staggering turnaround from the previous week’s 33-0 win away to Northampton.
The home crowd here love to howl at opposition forward passes but their forwards being mullered at scrums brings a visceral, unvocalised pain.
For Cheika, it was a familiar frustration. “We’re inconsistent, yeah, but we have been all year,” he said. “With [the challenge of] turning teams around, and coming in how I have come in, we’ve been working really hard on trying to be consistent – consistent mentality-wise, as well as rugby-wise.
“We’ve been really good sometimes, but we haven’t been consistent, and that’s what makes you great. That’s our tussle – if we can start building that consistency through the next five or six weeks, we’re going to have a good finish to the season. If not, it’s going to be on a bit of an edge. It’s going to be rough and rugged.”
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