Exciting times ahead.

All Blacks legend Richie McCaw has backed Ronan O’Gara to succeed at his former club the Crusaders. O’Gara has been granted an early release from his contract with Racing 92 to take up the exciting opportunity with the New Zealand franchise in the new year.

The former Ireland and Munster coach will replace Leon MacDonald and becomes the Crusaders first coaching appointment from outside New Zealand.

McCaw is excited to see how O’Gara performs and has welcomed some Northern Hemisphere influence.

“It’s quite exciting from a Crusaders point of view to have a first Northern Hemisphere influence,” McCaw told the Irish Independent.

“I’m guessing that the time Ronan had at Racing around guys like Dan Carter and Casey Laulala, he felt it was the right place to go. The Crusaders boys will ask the same questions. There is no doubt that he has a pretty good rugby brain and he will bring new ideas that the Crusaders boys will be keen to hear.”

McCaw thinks O’Gara will also embrace the culture of the Crusaders, as he did with Racing 92. He also believes the Crusaders will benefit from having O’Gara around.

“The Crusaders are traditionally the most successful franchise in Super Rugby. The culture and what the team stands for has been pretty well set up right from day one, led by guys like Wayne Smith and Todd Blackadder.

“It’s got a great culture, it’s just come off winning the last Super Rugby. It’s a pretty successful franchise that do things pretty damn well.

“It’s always a ‘team comes first before the individual’ type team. That’s the ethos of the team. He will come into the team like that.”

“The guys there are always driven to be better and will want to pick Ronan’s brain for experiences.

“I think it will be great. I’m sure he’ll have different ways of looking at things, he’ll probably take a while to see how the Crusaders work.

“It’s not as if he’s coming in as head coach. He’s obviously got his philosophy on how the team goes and build on what they did last year… having O’Gara there to add something different is a pretty good move.”