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Edwards to return to league as Wigan coach

Shaun Edwards is to return to rugby league as Wigan coach after the 2019 Rugby World Cup, with Adrian Lam taking control for the next season.

Edwards
Shaun Edwards will take over as Wigan coach after the Rugby World Cup next year. (AAP)

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Source: AAP


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Wigan rugby league great Shaun Edwards is to return to the Super League club as their new head coach but not until after the 2019 Rugby Union World Cup.

Edwards, 51, the most decorated player in rugby league history, will link up with the Warriors at the end of his current contract with Wales RU and will take up a three-year deal from 2020.

Wigan have also appointed another former favourite, Adrian Lam, who has been part of Mal Meninga's backroom staff with the Kangaroos, as interim head coach for the 2019 season.

The pair will replace Shaun Wane, who is leaving Wigan at the end of the season to become the high performance coach for the Scottish Rugby Union.

Edwards, who has spent the last 17 years in rugby union, won 37 trophies during a glittering career with his hometown club, including a record nine Challenge Cup triumphs.

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"Shaun Edwards is a legendary figure in both codes of rugby as a supremely gifted player and as a highly successful coach," Wigan chairman Ian Lenagan said.

"He is an inspirational figure, a born leader and a winner at everything he has turned his attention to.

"He also has Wigan Rugby League Club in his blood. We're delighted to have been able to bring Shaun back to the club which he represented with such distinction."

Edwards was at the heart of Wigan's historic Challenge Cup run in which they won eight back-to-back Wembley titles, and was named Man of Steel in 1990.

He won 36 caps for Great Britain and, after leaving Wigan in 1997, had brief spells at Bradford and London Broncos before retiring in 2000.

Edwards switched codes 12 months later, joining Wasps as defence and backs coach and taking over as head coach in 2005.

He guided Wasps to a hat-trick of domestic titles and the Heineken Cup in 2004 and 2007.

Edwards left Wasps in 2011 to join the Wales coaching team and helped the nation to Grand Slam success in 2008 and 2012 as well the Six Nations title in 2013.

He was defence coach for the British and Irish Lions on their tour of South Africa in 2009.


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