When Michael Cheika constantly reminds his players of the history of the Wallabies jersey and the magnitude of their chance to wear it, the fact that he never wore the green and gold adds weight to his words.
In the 10 months that Cheika, 48, has been coach of the Wallabies, discussion has often turned to his playing career as an abrasive, hard-nosed No.8 at Randwick where he played 286 senior games and in seven Shute Shield-winning sides, and why he never played for the Wallabies. Cheika played in the 1988 Australian under-21s and for NSW on their Great Britain spring tour in 1997, the first of three years in which he also captained Randwick before becoming a coach in 1999 with Padova in Italy. While he may have been considered for greater honours, it has often been thought that his cutting manner and penchant to say what he thinks was a contributing factor. 
But Cheika has now revealed his belief that if anyone is to blame it is him by leaving Australia from mid-1989 to 1994, in which time his career had begun an upward trajectory, to play in France and Italy. "I took the easy option. Like, I ran away," Cheika tells Greg Growden in the ESPN documentary Cheika's Wallabies - Hope of a Nation that was first aired on Wednesday night. "I gave myself plenty of excuses - they didn't like me, or I wasn't part of the establishment ... I always had an excuse and ran away because I went to play in Europe, which pretty much ruled me out because I missed a bit of the season here.
"I don't have any regrets about that because I played with a lot of great players who respected me as a player ... The ultimate is to play for Australia and right now I can say to the lads when they are in the change room with the gold jersey on that they don't know how lucky they are because a lot of us would never get the chance to get close."
Cheika also spoke of how he balances his competitiveness and emotional extremes, which have got him in hot water as they did last year when he received a six-month suspended ban by SANZAR that expired on   August 31 for abusing a cameraman in South Africa during the Waratahs' Super Rugby tour.
"I love winning games. It's a great feeling," Cheika says. "And you can't do that without hating losing games as well ... you have got to have both ends of the emotion. To enjoy winning, you have to hate losing."
Asked is he feels a need for his views to be heard, Cheika says: "Without crossing the rules ... I am not doing it to show others. I'm just doing [it] because that's how I am.
"I don't want to get in trouble ... No I don't. I don't want my players to get into trouble either ... but I also want to be me. That's who I am. I always wanted to do my best ... I realise that I will even get baited a bit more now. That's already happened this Super Rugby season."
But accountability for actions is what Cheika expects from himself and all his players. "It's about manning up," Cheika says. "I have told them. I'm not going to treat them like children. This is not school. This is about preparing the best you can.
"So if you don't prepare the best way possible, then you don't play - you're not in. Every player needs to create momentum for the other player by preparing his best.
"These types of tournaments are won by men who are prepared to make good decisions. That's what I expect from the team ..." But as he adds after: "It doesn't mean you can't have fun."