Wallabies v. South Africa

[Munts]

The Wallabies team has been announced. A good strong team in my view.

1. James Slipper

2. Stephen Moore

3. Sekope Kepu

4. Rob Simmons

5. James Horwill ©

6. Scott Fardy

7. Michael Hooper

8. Ben Mowen

9. Will Genia

10. Quade Cooper

11. James O’Connor

12. Christian Leali’ifano

13. Adam Ashley-Cooper

14. Nick Cummins

15. Israel Folau

Replacements

16. Saia Fainga’a

17. Scott Sio

18. Ben Alexander

19. Kane Douglas

20. Jake Schatz

21. Nic White

22. Matt Toomua

23. Jesse Mogg

Great to see Cooper and Cummins in and Folau to fullback. Sad to see Gill dropped though.

Good to see Link making some common sense changes.

Bring on the Boks!!

[ARRV]

Better team than against the ABs.

My thoughts - Link was always going to bring back Cooper - but didnt want the pressure of starting him against the ABs - and thought that it was likely that the ABs would win those tests - as they are a great team - so didnt want the anti QC crowd to go beserk if / when we lost those first 2 tests against the ABs.

Same for Folau to fullback.

Now he can really start to pick the team he always wanted without the pressure of AB test - plus starting at fortress Brisbane and agains the Boks who dont travel all that well. So this way the team can get some confidence and build on that.

Mind you - the ABs games were lost in the forwards and perhaps bringing in Kepu is good - the back row needs some more grunt - dont know where that is going to come from. Mowen is a good player but needs to muscle up as does Fardy.

Do we really need a 5/8 on the bench? Or can Toomua cover inside centre too?

[Ken Gargett]

toomua can cover in centre. assume mogg to fullback, izzy to wing and o'connor to out centre if problem there.

cannot believe gill dropped. insane.

[ogus]

Love AUS rugby

[frenchkiwi]

Will be good to see Folau operate at FB. Don't know that he's quite ready yet, but there's only one way for him to learn and that's by playing there. And Mogg is possibly even less ready, and beale injured so... easy choice. Hopefully Steyn will kick him plenty of ball so we can see him run.

the fear is the aussie pack will get monstered over in SA. Even the ABs are likely to find themselves on the back foot against the Alberts, Louws, Etzebeths et al. In Aus however the south africans tend to play poorly. The other scary thing this season is that steyn seems to have reacted to the competition of the Goosens etc and is actually varying his play... and some of those current or ex-cheetahs players know how to run it. The Bokke at home is lookin beastly this year.

however i see they've picked ponderous Pienaar at halfback, and there isn't much mobility in the forward pack selections for suncorp conditions. shaping up as another average performance for them.

Should be fun.

[Ken Gargett]

losing horwill is going to hurt.

izzy at fullback is a positive. mogg was very average v nz so izzy can only be better. he played every super 15 game there (bar one, i think) so you could argue that he has played far more rugby at fullback than at wing. and he was not seen, bar the intercept, on the wing last test. and nothing seems to bother him. he does not have a good kick though, even with the afl experience, so that is a bit of a concern.

will be tough but if we can't win this at suncorp, then we really are in strife.

[Karlos]

I missed almost all of the Super 15 because I was overseas travelling but from the few Super 15 games and Wallabies games I have watched, Issy has had no real impact at all. I'll be interested to see how he plays against a team like Argentina.

This of course isn't bad news to me, being a kiwi that lives in Australia !

[Philprop]

losing horwill is going to hurt.

izzy at fullback is a positive. mogg was very average v nz so izzy can only be better. he played every super 15 game there (bar one, i think) so you could argue that he has played far more rugby at fullback than at wing. and he was not seen, bar the intercept, on the wing last test. and nothing seems to bother him. he does not have a good kick though, even with the afl experience, so that is a bit of a concern.

will be tough but if we can't win this at suncorp, then we really are in strife.

I think you said it best about Folaus kicking. That's going to be a big concern. You need a fullback who can take a ball under pressure and provide some attack from deep, but you also need one that can return the ball with interest to relieve the pressure, without a accurate boot you then it a heavier workload on your fly half and wings to be back and cover. So off a quick turnover look for The Boks to send the ball deep and let AUS run at them.

As for the forwards game I think the Wallabies have the advantage in the loose and can match the physicality in the tackle and ruck area, but the scrum as always will be a major concern.

[Ken Gargett]

I think you said it best about Folaus kicking. That's going to be a big concern. You need a fullback who can take a ball under pressure and provide some attack from deep, but you also need one that can return the ball with interest to relieve the pressure, without a accurate boot you then it a heavier workload on your fly half and wings to be back and cover. So off a quick turnover look for The Boks to send the ball deep and let AUS run at them.

As for the forwards game I think the Wallabies have the advantage in the loose and can match the physicality in the tackle and ruck area, but the scrum as always will be a major concern.

will be very interesting to see what link does with cooper on defence. if same as reds, he'll play back a fair bit and they can use his boot.

[frenchkiwi]

will be very interesting to see what link does with cooper on defence. if same as reds, he'll play back a fair bit and they can use his boot.

horwill out?

good point, that is a catch 22 as well, as i'm sure they'd like to use Folau to counter-attack from Boks kicks but putting Cooper at fullback on D would cancel that. i'd keep Cooper defending at 10 as a red herring, the Boks would run at him all day but much easier defending a channel when you know where the attacks are going to come!

When is Beale back?

[Ken Gargett]

When is Beale back?

too soon whenever it is.

they may play izzy on one side and quade the other. if they did that, be interesting to see which side the boks did kick to.

[Philprop]

You're probably right that Cooper will be playing back a lot. His Defense is the one thing I don't like about him. As a Professional rugby player playing at the highest level, you have to be able today Defense and be able to do something with ball in hand. cooper has proven himself to be a great running fly half and can step anyone, but he has to man up and make tackles. There is no excuse for it. At least Toomua will stick a tackle, even if it is only around the ankles.