Tiger Woods’ swing, the unlikely source of Cheika’s motivation.

Michael Chieka didn’t quite take a sledgehammer to the Waratahs’ chronic problems; he took golf clubs instead.

As his players gathered in the change-room before the biggest Super Rugby game of their careers, and for most the biggest in their lives, Cheika slowly began to pull out 23 golf clubs, each personalised with female names.

“Bertha” for prop Sekope Kepu, “Florence” for centre Kurtley Beale.

Cheika is understood to be a big fan of the crushing drive of golf champion Tiger Woods, and all season he has asked his men to “swing without fear”, and “let it go”.

Cheika is growing a fast reputation as master motivator with his unique and quirky pre-match speeches.

After the “Poker Face” drawing stunt earlier this year, players suspected he’d have a good one for the final against the Crusaders.

Each held their club, and listened to Cheika ram home the message and forecast that this game against the Crusaders would be won in the final minutes.

“All year he’s been telling us to go out there and let the clubs go, basically saying go out there and trust your instinct, back your gut-feeling and deliver a really good performance,” centre Kurtley Beale said.

“It has stayed with us throughout the whole year and it became a bit of a symbol for us before games to go back to, to realise what we need to do in tough times and difficult circumstances to deliver the football we want to play.

“Obviously throughout the whole year we’ve been trying to play a certain style of football, and we’ve done that.

“With symbols like the [golf] club, and letting it go and really swinging it and not giving a damn about anything else, it’s really rubbed off on a lot of players.”

And in the greatest test of Cheika’s mantra, to play attacking rugby at all costs, in any situation under every type of defensive stress, the players drove it home. Fore!

The 33-32 win, giving the Waratas their first Super Rugby title in 19 years of trying, now places Cheika among the best domestic coaches of the professional era.

No other man has coached a northern hemisphere team to the Heineken Cup trophy (Leinster 2009) and a southern hemisphere side to the Super Rugby title.

He has done it within 18 months of arriving at Moore Park, but has already begun plans for the title defence in 2015.

“It’s the small things, and the persistence in what we’re doing is what I think is a real good character in the team,” Cheika said, adding that overseas perception about the Tahs being soft would not merely disappear with one title.

“Once we’ve done it for a few more years, being solid and aggressive at the ball, and people don’t think like that, then you’ve done it,” he said.

Cheika is a wild mix of passion, humour, rage, compassion, intelligence and guile.

His engaging but forceful personality has allowed him to get the entire Waratas playing roster to fall into a line of solidarity, but it has also landed him in trouble on occasions.

He was rebuked for abusing a cameraman during a game in South Africa, was sent a bill by the Brumbies for damaging the coaches’ box following a loss in Canberra, and has run foul of higher authorities by refusing to bow to their rules over his own position at NSW, and blasting the process when the ARU ruled Israel Folau out of a game.

Cheika was circumspect about his roller-coaster ride since arriving in Sydney 18 months ago.

“I’ve got a personal challenge every morning with four [children] under five, I’m getting used to those personal challenges,” he grinned.

“I’ve enjoyed it. I’ve loved it.”

“I want to enjoy it as well, I want to be happy because when you’re happy, you do a better job.”

“I’ve tried to learn from my errors, as I’ve always tried to do, and be a better person and a better coach.”

There is no doubting Cheika’s capacity now, achieving what previous Waratahs coaches Chris Hawkins, Matt Williams, Ian Kennedy, Bob Dwyer, Ewen McKenzie, Chris Hickey and Michael Foley could not deliver for Australia’s most important yet fragile franchise.