The last coach to garner any sort of success with Edinburgh was a pugnacious Englishman called Andy Robinson, who took a bunch of perennial underperformers to second place in the Celtic League in 2008-9.

Robinson did not spend significant sums of money, he barely changed the playing squad; he simply adopted a pragmatic approach, beasted his players in training and focused relentlessly on detail. And with that hard work and a fair wind came a success that surprised everybody except Robinson.

Richard Cockerill, the latest man to try to turn Edinburgh into a force in Pro14 rugby, has a lot in common with his compatriot. As players, each had a huge amount of success at club level, with Leicester and Bath respectively, and both are confrontational characters with an unfailing belief that unstinting effort and brutal honesty are the pathway to success.

Both arrived in the capital having suffered crushing rejection after initial coaching success: Robinson won the World Cup with England as forwards coach but went on to be unceremoniously fired after taking over from Sir Clive Woodward; Cockerill won back to back Premiership titles with the Tigers before being shown the door.