0
Beale put on standby as Barnes shadow
Wayne Smith | August 24, 2007
IT is what every Australian player fantasises about, getting a phone call from head coach John Connolly just as the Wallabies are about to fly off to the World Cup. Kurtley Beale got three of them and didn't answer.
Not that Connolly needed the 18- year-old to pack a bag and rush out to Sydney airport to take the place of a late scratching. It wasn't nearly that urgent, although there is a slim possibility that Beale could head off to France to play in the World Cup.
What Connolly wanted to tell Beale was that he had just been selected as the shadow replacement for Queensland Reds five-eighth Berrick Barnes, who left for the pre-World Cup training camp in Portugal still troubled by a groin strain.
"We're confident Berrick will come good and be all right but he's not home free just yet," Connolly said just before boarding the plane for Europe.
"Doc (Martin Raftery) will have another look at Berrick at the end of the week in Portugal and then we'll decide whether he goes on to France or we call in the shadow player."
The pity for Beale is that his two-try, man-of-the-match performance for Western Sydney Rams against Central Coast Rays in the Australian Rugby Championship last weekend hadn't come a couple of weeks earlier.
There is no doubt national selectors Connolly, Scott Johnson and Michael O'Connor, felt they had few options in choosing a back-up to Steve Larkham at five-eighth and would surely have welcomed Beale in the sort of form he displayed last weekend when they finalised the squad.
Although the selectors have designated replacements in every position, the other members of the train-on squad who will jump the highest when the phone rings will be those shadowing players under a mild fitness cloud - Brumbies backrower Jone Tawake (back-up to number eights David Lyons and Wycliff Palu) and Queensland tighthead Rodney Blake (back-up to Guy Shepherdson).
Underpinning assistant coach Michael Foley's confidence yesterday that the Wallabies can win the World Cup was the calibre of the senior players.
"The one common denominator of all the teams that have won past World Cups is that they had the best group of senior players at that time - and for this tournament, that's Australia," Foley said.
"Our group of senior players are better than New Zealand's."
Better, too, than England's, in Foley's opinion, despite the fact the world champion has picked a squad with an average age of 29 years, two years older than the Wallabies' average.
"When I talk about experience, I'm not necessarily thinking in a chronological sense or even in terms of the number of Test caps won, but rather of those players who in tight situations will make the right decisions."
Foley credited the senior players, not the coaching staff, for turning around the Wallabies in the second half against the All Blacks in Melbourne in late June, when Australia upset New Zealand for the first time in three years.
"The real behind-the-scenes turnaround started with the senior players, not necessarily the coaches," Foley said. "Stirling Mortlock's captaincy has really flourished this year, but the reason is that he has George Gregan and Phil Waugh rallying right behind him. One of the great shames of Gregan's captaincy was that he never enjoyed that same sort of support."
Reply With Quote
