Rob Baxter signs new Exeter Chiefs contract until 2015

Baxter captained Exeter for a decade before becoming a coach

Exeter Chiefs head coach Rob Baxter and his coaching team have signed contract extensions to keep them at Sandy Park until the end of the 2014-15 season.

Assistant coach Ali Hepher, skills coach Ricky Pellow, academy boss Rob Gibson and team manager Robin Cowling have signed new deals.

Baxter promoted to the Premiership in his first season.

"I really wanted to keep them all," said Exeter chief executive Tony Rowe.

"It's a fantastic coaching team and as you try to progress, the most difficult thing is to get hold of a good coaching team.

"But I've got one and I'm the first to acknowledge the effort they have put in," he added.

And Rowe, whose backing has seen the club move to Sandy Park and achieve Premiership status, paid tribute to the way the group had helped push Exeter into rugby's elite.

"They were untested in the Premiership and apart from Ali, who Rob recruited himself, I was instrumental in putting that group together.

"It's an awesome group and I consider it quite a coup to have kept them all," he said.

Exeter finished eighth in their first season in the top flight last season and currently sit third in the league as well as topping their group in the European Challenge Cup.

Baxter was former boss Pete Drewett's assistant and played for 14 years with Exeter, captaining the side for 10 of them.