(Reuters) - Scottish rugby will be hoping that performance guru David Nucifora can do for them what he did for Ireland after he agreed a part-time coaching role with the team.
Nucifora, a former test hooker for his native Australia, spent more than a decade as performance director of the Irish Rugby Union and is credited with overseeing a structural rebuild that helped them become one of the strongest teams in world rugby.
He has now accepted an advisory role with Scottish Rugby to oversee the next stage of their player development programme.
The 62-year-old will not be full-time, operating on a consultancy basis over the next two years.
"To ensure we can compete at the highest level we need someone of David’s experience to design and implement, at pace, a structure that supports our best talent," Scottish Rugby chairman John McGuigan said in a statement on Tuesday.
Rugby Australia announced in December that Nucifora would return home to work as an advisor for them after completing his duties with Ireland’s sevens teams at the Olympics but he will spend portions of the year in Scotland.
Scottish rugby has long struggled with a limited playing pool although they have beaten England in their last four Calcutta Cup meetings, as well as Australia and France over the last five years.
They did not make it out of the pool stages at last year’s World Cup in France and finished fourth in this year’s Six Nations Championship.
(Writing by Mark Gleeson in Cape Town; Editing by xEd Osmond)
