Burgess’ knee, Sharpe gets the arse, Foles rolls

Matt Rowley August 17, 2008 1

No Gravatar OK, I’m a little late on the 28 man squad for the South African tour, but hey, everything works a bit slower in rural France.

The big upsets are:
1 – Luke Burgess is out with a small tear in his miniscus (knee), sustained in training. While Burgo hasn’t yet fully aclimatised to international rugby, he still injects a level of speed and dynamism that we’ll need. He’s not back till at best the crazy Bledisloe in Honkers.

2 – Sharpe is dropped from the squad. A big move by Aussie Robbie to eject so much experience. Perhaps the injury to Elsom tips the balance in favour of Mumm and McMenimum as cover for both lock and 6.

Other news is that Michael Foley, the current Wallabies restart (forwards) coach is off at the end of this season to join the Tahs. His reasoning is “time at home with the 4 kids”, but if the face was still fitting in the Wallaby camp then I’d wager he wouldn’t be taking off just yet.

Wallbies squad in South Africa
Stirling Mortlock (c), Ben Alexander, Adam Ashley-Cooper, Berrick Barnes, Al Baxter, Richard Brown, Sam Cordingley, Ryan Cross, Matt Dunning, Rocky Elsom, Adam Freier, Matt Giteau, James Horwill, Peter Hynes, Hugh McMeniman, Drew Mitchell, Dean Mumm, Stephen Moore, Wycliff Palu, Tatafu Polota-Nau, Benn Robinson, Brett Sheehan, George Smith, Timana Tahu, Lote Tuqiri, Lachie Turner, Phil Waugh, Dan Vickerman..

Discussion »

  • Bobas

    I think these selections just prove Deans isn’t the best selector.

    This squad will not win in South Africa, unless the box gift us the game like they did to NZ.

    I’m all for sharpe no starting but if we loose vicks or horwill early i’d rather have him run on than mcmanerberri or mumm in lock. I’m Disappointedly he’s axed after standing up well in previous games (I wrote him off till his recent displays too).

    Turner or Mitchell in fullback goes against his big (no fear) back three balance that he has been creating well with coops, hynes and tiqiri.

    The matt burke tipped Gerrard in my opinion is our best option is fullback.

    Good to see Sheehan get a call up, he’s been in awesome form in recent times, I hope he starts and shows he can do what he does in club rugby on the international stage.

    Load of bullcrap deans talking about putting giteau into 5/8th. But if it did happen i spose we’d see tahu in 12 and buns in 10, dont think it’d work and they’ll never try it.

    Interesting to see who he uses in 6, i think mcmenimum will get the nod, but elsoms shoes are too big to fill for him.

    I like to see players who add something extra take people’s places. But with Hoiles out of the squad aswell for no reason there’s no pace to add into that position.

    Iaonne is so good how he misses out on getting a chance on the bench or on the wing is ridiculous.

Close