Exeter to keep star Mieres
Exeter Chiefs head coach Rob Baxter believes there is still more to come from Ignacio Mieres after the Argentine ace agreed a new contract with the Aviva Premiership club.
After several weeks of discussions between Mieres and club officials, the talented 24-year-old back has put pen to paper on a deal that will extend his stay at Sandy Park for a further two years.
Having arrived in Devon back in October 2010 from club side Deportivo Francesca, the flyhalf has quickly established himself as a key member of Baxter’s first team squad and is the club’s leading points-scorer this term with 240 points from 22 appearances.
And his decision to prolong his stay in English rugby’s top flight has been welcomed by Baxter, who had made no secret of his desire to keep as many of his current playing squad on the books heading into next season.
“I’m delighted Nacho has decided to stay with us,” he said. “To be fair to him, he said from the outset that he very keen to stay and we wanted him to stay with us, but there were one or two issues which delayed things a little bit. Those issues have now been resolved, we’ve got everything sorted and he’s put pen to paper, which is fantastic.”
The Buenos Aires-born star has been in sparkling form this season and currently finds himself amongst the top four marksmen in the Premiership. However, Baxter believes his playmaker still has plenty in his locker and is confident that over the next two years his leader at No.10 will develop even more.
“We think he is still improving and that’s why we were keen to keep him,” added Baxter. “There was never any issue about Nacho staying other than dealing with the Argentinian situation, which has become a little clearer now.”
The decision by Mieres to prolong his stay in the Westcountry follows that recently made by Hoani Tui, Jason Shoemark, Simon Alcott and Tom Hayes, all of whom have signed new contracts.
Baxter added: “We are not going to have a lot of changes this season. I know a lot of people kind of expect lots of changes each year, but in truth we’ll only probably make a handful of changes. We feel we are a good squad and we feel we are very much about progressing what we have got –and building some stability and some good foundations.”
