Munster CEO change won't impact McMillan future

The New Zealander had raised doubts about his status following the failed attempt to hire former Chiefs assistant Roger Randle last season.

Munster head coach Clayton McMillan before the United Rugby Championship match between Munster and Vodacom Bulls at Thomond Park. Pic: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile

Head coach Clayton McMillan insisted the arrival of a new chief executive at Munster in the coming months has no bearing on his own future with the province.

The New Zealander is not yet midway through the three-year contract he signed when agreeing to leave Super Rugby’s Chiefs to replace Graham Rowntree as Munster boss ahead of last season. Yet he raised doubts about his status following the failed attempt to hire former Chiefs assistant Roger Randle as his new attack coach at the tail end of the 2025-26 campaign.

The bid to contract Randle was mired in controversy regarding both the process behind the appointment and the social media outcry which followed the re-airing of a 1997 rape allegation for which the candidate was never charged and has always denied.

Randle’s contract had been signed but was cancelled by mutual agreement but the affair initiated an Independent Governance and Organisational Review commissioned by the Munster Rugby board in May. That Review is understood to have been delivered in coincidence with the resignation announced last Thursday of CEO Ian Flanagan, who will depart at the end of October.

An interim CEO is set to be appointed with the search for a permanent successor to be set in motion. Having called in May for assurances from the organisation that everyone with Munster Rugby was “pulling in the same direction”, McMillan on Saturday night was forthright that the prospect of a new incoming chief executive would have no bearing on his own future at the province.

It was a one-word answer, “No,” in fact after he had responded to the news of Flanagan’s departure.

“I just think about the person who's got a mother and a father and a wife and children and the decision has been made,” McMillan said.

“We wish him all the best in whatever comes next in his journey, but as is always the case when people come and go, our job, my job and the players' job is to focus on how we prepared during the week, and the performance that we put on the weekend and that didn't change this week and it won't change next week."

McMillan added it would not be difficult to guard against Flanagan’s departure becoming a distraction for his squad.

"Not hard at all. If we compare it to (the controversies of) last year, this is a walk in the park. I'm not trying to say that the decision is a big one that Ian's made, but again, he's made that decision and we respect it and we wish him and his family all the best.

"We're not a good enough team at the moment to distract ourselves with anything other than performing, putting our best foot forward at training and hopefully delivering our best on weekends."

McMillan had been speaking following Munster’s first win of the season, a 26-22 bonus-point victory over the Bulls at Thomond Park in URC round two and ahead of this Saturday’s first road trip, a visit to derby rivals Ulster in Belfast.

Munster lost lock Fineen Wycherley to a shoulder injury in training ahead of kick-off while loosehead prop Michael Milne (rolled ankle), opening try-scoring wing Diarmuid Kilgallen (tight hamstring) and John Hodnett (failed Head Injury Assessment) are the only fresh doubts from the Bulls games.

The head coach did, however, reel off a list of likely returnees for the trip north.

"Diarmuid Barron, Tadhg (Beirne), Ruadhán Quinn, Alex Nankivell. There's a good handful that will be back available next week.

"Max Clein will also be back, so he's our fourth contracted hooker, he's been out since the middle of pre-season but he was out there training today. He could have played if we needed him to, but off the back of probably not enough contact training, we just thought it was best that we put Kieran (Brookes, former England tighthead prop) in there. Kieran's actually played there before so he's more than comfortable.

"But yeah, for a good portion at the start of the week we were probably concerned whether we had two viable bodies to put there (at hooker). We searched the whole country and a little bit further abroad and didn't come up with too much, so what you saw out there tonight was what we live with."