Melbourne Rebels coach Rod Macqueen will stand down after the club’s final Super Rugby match against the Western Force at AAMI Park this weekend.
Macqueen has not confirmed or denied that he will be leaving but a club spokesperson told Melbourne radio the coach would be finishing at the end of the season.
Macqueen would only say that an announcement would be made by the club in the near future.
“This week we really want to concentrate on the last game, obviously it’s going to be very important to us,” Macqueen told Sportal.
“But next week we will be announcing exactly what’s happening.”
Sources close to the team say that Macqueen’s position will be taken over by his assistant Damien Hill who is highly regarded.
There is however some confusion over Macqueen’s future with the Rebels as he may stay on with the Super Rugby franchise in a director’s role.
“We like to do things our way, we’re looking to see how that’s going to work,” Macqueen said.
“There’s been some very good positives to come out of the first year, we’ve done a lot of things right off the field and got a very good presence in Melbourne.”
“We’ve got to take what we’ve learnt this year and put it on the paddock next year.”
Under Macqueen the Rebels have won three matches and lost 12 and a win over the Force on Saturday will promote them above the Lions who are in last place.
“It’s been a great challenge, I came here with my eyes open and what hasn’t let me down is the Melbourne public and the way they’ve embraced rugby,” Macqueen said.
“Three wins, we want to do better than that – if you want to measure it and this season’s about measurement – we’ve done better than any other franchise (in their first year), so you could say we did better than expected.”