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Dave Rennie issues fierce challenge to Marika Koroibete replacement
By AAP
Jordan Petaia's off-the-ball efforts will be under the microscope when the Wallabies winger attempts to fill the void left by Marika Koroibete in his Test return against Argentina.
Koroibete's personal leave has opened a spot on the wing for Petaia in the side's final Rugby Championship Test, on the Gold Coast on Saturday.
One of world rugby's most influential wingers and arguably again Australia's best player this year, Koroibete's absence may highlight exactly how important he is to Dave Rennie's improving side.
The coach hopes that's not the case though, imploring the prodigiously talented 21-year-old to meet the mark set by his senior partner.
"We have the luxury of looking at footage from a variety of angles," Rennie said of Koroibete.
"But his work ethic is phenomenal; the amount of very high speed metres he runs every time he's chasing kicks or kicks offs.
"His ability to get back, get to the other side of the field.
"That's what we've talked to Jordy about.
"He's got a great skill set, but he's got to work a lot harder off the ball.
"He's got aspirations of being a 15, so it's been a focus and he certainly trained that way this week.
"He is not chained to the 15-metre channel. He's been all over the park and prepared well."
The impressive form of fellow winger Andrew Kellaway has kept Petaia on the bench for most of this season while injuries have already stalled the career of the youngest Australian to play in a World Cup.
Veteran prop Greg Holmes, 38, says the team's improved depth is noticeable as he prepares for the most unlikely of Test comebacks.
"I think it's a really settled team and they're good across the board now," said Holmes, who last played for Australia in 2016 and debuted in 2005 under Eddie Jones.
"When I first started our set-piece was an issue and we had a really sharp backline ... then our forward pack starts going okay and our backline misfires. At the moment, I see our full team firing.
"I think we've got a forward pack that can match it with anyone in the world at the moment and we've got some sharp backs with Quadey [Cooper] pulling the strings there; he's done an incredible job.
"When you can get a team firing like that they can beat an yone, and I think this team can."
- Murray Wenzel
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Latest Comments
Turn it up. Give me your john A game would ya!
Go to commentsI didn't really get the should tone from it, but maybe because I was just reading it as my own thoughts.
What I read it as was examples of how they played well enough in every game to be able to win it.
Yeah I dunno if Ben wouldn't see it that way (someone else would for sure need to point it out to him though), I'm more in the Ben not appreciating that those close losses werent one off scenarios camp. Sure you can look at dubious decisions causing them to have to play with 14 or 13 men at the death as viable reasons but even in the games they won without such difficulties they made a real struggle of it (compared to how good some of their first half play was). This kind of article where you trying to point out the 3 losses really would most likely have been wins only really makes sense/works when your other performances make those 3 games (or endings) stand out.
There might have been a sentence here and there to ensure some good comment numbers but when he's signing off the article by saying things like ..
and..
I don't really see it. Always making sure people are upto date with the SH standing/perspective! NZ went through some tough times with so many different perspectives and reasons why, but then it was.. amusing how.. behind everyone was once they turned a corner. More of these 'unfortunate' results returned against SA and France at the start of the RWC which made it extra tasty to catch other teams out when they did bring it. So that created some 'conscious' perspective that I just kept going and sharing re thoughts on similar predicaments of other teams, I had been really confident that Wallabies displays vs NZ were real, that the Argentines can backup their thing against Aus and SA (and so obviously the rest), and current one is that England are actually consistent and improving with their attack (which everyone should get onboard with), and I'm expecting a more dominant display against Japan (even though they should have more of their experienced internationals for this one) that highlights further growth from July. 👍
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