Amongst all the angst and hysteria of yellow jerseys being called yellow and not gold. And the dramas of the toxic environment comments. And the thousands of comments, articles and forum threads devoted to Quade Cooper being or not being selected for the Wallabies squad. It seems to me that one small fact seems to have been neglected.
How do the wallabies go with and without Quade Cooper?
Quade had been playing for the Wallabies since 2008 and has played in 38 of the 71 matches played since then. Because Quade played all the matches at the world cup I haven’t added a seperate chart for them although they are included in the ‘all games’ section.
As you can see with Cooper the Wallabies have won many more games than with out him. This table shows just how stark the difference is.
Wallabies Bledisloe Cup Coopers Bledisloe Cup Wallabies TRC Cooper TRC Wallabies All Games Cooper All Games
played 12 5 15 13 33 38
Won 1 2 4 8 16 26
Win % 8.33% 40.00% 26.67% 61.54% 48.48% 68.42%
The fact that his win percentage is much higher than the Wallabies against the quality opposition in Bledisloe cup games and Rugby Championship games speaks volumes for his big match temperament.
I’ll leave it to you to make your own conclusions on this subject.
Given his form in Super Rugby and these statistics in my opinion the only reasons Robbie Deans has to leave Quade Cooper out of the Wallabies squad would have to be personal.
Here’s some Cooper vision to remind you what he can do.
