Yeah I don't get how anyone could possibly consider Cheika as a NRL possibility. I have seen merkins say that Moses gave him a glowing endorsement, but Mitch is hardly going to say to a reporter that he's a dud.
As much as NRL coaches are the sum of their squad, their assistants, their depth through the grades and (from year to year) injuries and other random f**kery, experience in the (or next to the) hot seat means a everything. Otherwise merkins like the Walker Bros and other left of centre randoms would have been given gigs by now.