Willie Peters is made for England head coach role and should not be overlooked

The Rugby Football League’s search for a new national team head coach is underway, though in reality, they don’t need to look very far.

Willie Peters is the favourite to land the role, and for good reason. He has done a remarkable job with Hull KR, and if anyone is capable of doing it with England, it’s him.

International coaching is different to club coaching, that much is true, but Peters possesses qualities that are essential to nailing it at international level.

The most precious of those is his attention to detail. Anyone who has worked with Peters will tell you they have seen nothing like it. Luke Gale, a recent addition to Rovers’ coaching staff, told me recently that Peters’ thoroughness was exceptional. This is someone who has played for Wayne Bennett in the World Cup.

One of the key components to success in a World Cup, one when you’re on tour, is making sure every last detail is nailed down. Those who have worked with Peters say they have worked with nobody better in that regard.

But beyond that, creating a culture and environment where players can be themselves, enjoy themselves but also train to a level is paramount. This, again, is something Peters has very clearly done at Rovers. Players at the club, but probably more telling, those who have left, say they’ve never trained as hard than under the Robins boss.

Yet there’s also a unity among the group. It was something that is noticeable within the Rovers group right now, and something I wrote about just last week. Bringing together players from different clubs is a different challenge, but is only like bringing together players from different backgrounds.

Throw in his knowledge of the NRL and the Kangaroos; he was assistant to Kevin Walters during the Ashes, it is very difficult to look past him.

This is, of course, without factoring in the remarkable success he has overseen at Hull KR, a club that hadn’t won a trophy for almost 40 years when he arrived, they are now treble winners. That speaks for itself.

There will be plenty of candidates keen to secure the role, that much is clear already. But in Peters, England have their man.