The Premiership’s most decorated player, Geordan Murphy ended his 16th and final season in a Leicester Tigers shirt in 2012/13 with the eighth Premiership title of his career and announced that he would be moving into coaching at the club.

Murphy became assistant backs coach for 2013/14, working in the backroom team led by Richard Cockerill and subsequently under Aaron Mauger and Matt O’Connor.

Arriving in Leicester as a teenager with just one senior season at Naas RFC in Ireland behind him, Geordan made his debut against Rotherham in November 1997 and the last of his 322 appearances in May 2013 against London Irish.

He scored 93 tries and 691 points for the club as well as playing in 72 Tests for Ireland and making seven appearances (including Tests against Argentina and New Zealand) with the British & Lions.

Playing in four Heineken Cup Finals for Tigers, Geordan collected back-to-back winners’ medals in 2001 and 2002. He also starred in a record seven Premiership Finals for the club.

He is Leicester’s leading appearance-holder and tryscorer in the European Cup, and is 17th on the club’s all-time tryscorers’ chart.

He started his coaching career by leading Tigers to the Premiership Sevens Final for the first time in August 2013 and also took a lead role in the run to the Anglo-Welsh Cup Final in 2016/17 as Tigers became the first three-time winners of the tournament.

He took over as interim head coach when O’Connor departed after the opening game of the 2018/19 season and the appointment was confirmed in December 2018 before moving to the Director of Rugby role with the arrival of Steve Borthwick in July 2020.

Follow Geordan Murphy on social media

Twitter: @geordanmurphy | Instagram: @geordanmurphy