Star Players
The Australian Rugby Union have done a lot of work since the previous RWC in order to create a more affective talent tracking system. The height of this being the newly formed National Rugby Championship or Super B competition, in which Australia's future stars have a shot at impressing during the internationals. Furthermore there has been a terrific rise of talent coming out of a refreshed Super Rugby system (there have been 4 coach changes since the last RWC) players such as Israel Folau, and Alofa Alofa have code switched from rugby league and proved a tremendous success. Whilst others such as Matt Toomua, Bernard Foley, and captain Michael Hooper have all rose from Super Rugby to meet the demands of Internationals. On another note players such as Kurtley Beale, and Wycliff Palu have resurrected their careers and are playing their best rugby a long time due to the refreshing change of culture being implemented by most teams. Nonetheless there have also been some sad cases in the last couple of years great players with tons of potential have left or gone over sea's because of disagreements with the ARU's recent attempts to tighten their belts financially key players such as Digby Ioane, and Ben Mowen have moved to France after being shunted by the union and there are numerous other cases.
How They've Fared
Australia have won the tournament a total of 2 times out of its 7 previous iterations, including the last time the tournament was hosted in England during the 4th tournament back in 1999. They haven't won since then coming runners up in 2003, losing in the quarters of 2007, and coming 3rd in 2011. In this years iteration Australia join the "pool of death" aptly named because of its inclusion of rugby giants such as Fiji, Wales, and hosts England. Australia has a good record against Fiji having won 16 of the 19 games they've played, however they run the risk of getting tipped up if the Australians get too cocky (such a thing happened last year when the Wallabies hosted Samoa for a pre-tournament warm up and went down 23-31). Moreover they have an impressive record against Wales winning all 8 encounters since last years world cup, although there is never much of a margin and the games usually comes down to a last minute period of play. Against England the record is not quite so impressive having lost there last encounter 20-14.
Vs. Fiji 23/09
Millenium Stadium (Cardiff)
Vs. Uruguay 27/09
Villa Park
Vs. England 03/10
Twickenham
Vs. Wales 10/10
Twickehnham
Photo by David Molloy
David molloy
Israel Folau