Ex-Wallabies coach joins Aussie rivals for Rugby Championship
Michael Cheika may have been the Wallabies' coach for five years, but when the Rugby Championship gets underway in November, all bets are off with his home nation.
In a spicy subplot to the four-team rugby tournament, Cheika will try to bring about the downfall of his Wallabies successor Dave Rennie as part of Argentina's coaching staff when they arrive for the series, starting in November.
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Rennie will coach Australia for the first time in next month's two-Test tour of New Zealand after Cheika stepped away following last year's World Cup quarter-final exit.
He has since worked as a consultant with the NRL's Sydney Roosters but will join former Australian assistant-turned Los Pumas head coach Mario Ledesma.
Ledesma said he had proposed the plan earlier this year and was met with immediate interest, the former Wallabies coach since helping with logistics and tactical advice ahead of their visit.
"We agreed from the first moment ... he always liked Argentine rugby a lot," Ledesma said.
"It is an excellent opportunity to continue learning all because he is a person who thinks a lot about things outside the box, who has an innovative and super creative vision, different from that of many coaches that I've come across."
Argentina are set to face Australia in the third and fourth round of the tournament in Sydney and Newcastle.
SANZAAR remains confident the tournament will proceed despite New Zealand Rugby chief executive Mark Robinson saying the All Blacks "hadn't agreed" to the six-week schedule released on Thursday.
Rugby Australia insists they're not to blame for a set of fixtures that could leave the All Blacks locked away in hotel quarantine over Christmas.
New Zealand are crying foul over playing the last match of the six-week tournament - a Bledisloe Cup Test against the Wallabies in Sydney - on December 12.
Under current NZ government guidelines players must quarantine for two weeks when they arrive home, meaning they won't be out in time to spend Christmas with their families.
All Blacks players facing Christmas in quarantine
New Zealand Rugby issued a statement soon after the draw announcement on Thursday saying they believed the All Blacks' last match would be on December 5.
"We haven't agreed to this schedule and are disappointed at the announcement," said NZR chief executive Mark Robinson.
"We understand the commercial considerations in the scheduling. However, the wellbeing of our people is an incredibly important factor in this also."
Even New Zealand Prime Minster Jacinda Ardern weighed in, saying there was an agreement on the schedule in place.
"There was an agreement that those games would conclude by the sixth of December and if everyone sticks to that, then it wouldn't be an issue," Adern said of the possible quarantine.
Australia was already in New Zealand's bad books after pinching the hosting rights but RA boss Rob Clarke said the six-week schedule wasn't their fault.
It's believed the other competing nations - world champions South Africa and Argentina - pushed for the longer tournament.
"On two formal occasions Rugby Australia was supportive of altering the draw so that the Rugby Championship could be played over five weeks .... on both occasions, that proposal was rejected which means there was never an agreement to finish the tournament on Saturday 5 December 2020," Clarke said in a statement.
He said RA would do whatever it could to make sure the All Blacks avoided spending Christmas in quarantine and hoped with more than two months before the December 12 match a solution could be found.
According to organising body SANZAAR, it appears that solution rests with the NZ government relaxing quarantine rules.
with Yahoo Sport staff
