Wednesday’s Rugby News has Karmichael hunting for a contract, maybe more jersey. Duncan Paia’aua paia’making, and Baabaas getting a win.
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Huntin’ For A Karntract
Karmichael Hunt is looking like he’ll get a new contract, although the 30-year-old will get less than his rumoured $1.5m contract than brought him over from nayfl.
However, now he’s playing for the Wallabies, a national top-up might come into the equation.
“I do want to stay in Queensland and Australia and be a part of the script going forward, so I’d love to see the feeling’s mutual,” Hunt told rugby.com.au, as he toyed with wads of cash.
“I don’t think we’re too far off getting a deal done, so it’d be nice to put it away sooner rather than later.
“Although I have had a setback with my ankle this year, for the most part of this year it’s been quite a consistent year for me, so looking to hopefully build on it and get some more games in the gold jersey and play some better football.”
With Folau out, Hunt is licking his lips at the opportunity to represent his country in the under-the-ball stakes.
“I mean obviously there’s a vacancy there, because he’s not going to be coming on tour, but who fills that role, we’ll have to wait and see,” he slathered all over rugby.com.au’s recording device.
“Obviously I play it up in Queensland but Cheik is Cheik when it comes to his selections for the team so we’ll just have to wait and see what he wants to do there.
“I’ve been training a bit at 15, doing a bit of playmaking as well, but we won’t know our makeup until Thursday.
“It’s just good to be back playing football and being healthy and being amongst the guys, so there’s a lot of new guys here I haven’t played with, so it’s just understanding each other’s game.
“Obviously the structure within the team is pretty similar to June, so I didn’t really have to get to know too much more coming in but just more so getting the footy in the hands and playing footy with these guys. I’m looking forward to it.”
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Will We See More Of Indig. Jersey?
The chatter all around every town in all of Australia has been about that Wallabies jersey on the weekend. Fox Sports reckons it has the latest goss (it always does).
“The Australian Rugby Union was waiting to see how the jersey was received by the public and players before making a decision on whether to make it a more regular fixture,” begins the report. Hmm, the ARU struggling to make a decision? How very odd.
“And, given the hugely popular response to the jersey and the drought-breaking 23-18 win over the All Blacks that came with it, discussions have already begun on how best to continue to embrace the concept going forward.”
Fox Sports then quotes an ARU spokesperson (they have one?).
“The response to the Indigenous jersey was overwhelmingly positive among fans, past and current players, and most importantly within the Indigenous community,” the spokesperson said.
“There have been preliminary discussions about using the jersey again in future and we will confirm our plans in due course.
“It was great to see so many of the Indigenous jerseys in the crowd on Saturday night and it has been an popular seller since launched in July.”
Ooooooh.
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Paia’off
Duncan Paia’aua is looking forward to being in and around the mix come Saturday, especially so as his mentor Quade Cooper will probably be the opposite 10.
“It will be a huge honour if I get called up to play in the gold jersey, it will be interesting to see how I go at No.10,” Paia’aua said, according to Fox Sports.
“I’ve learned a lot off Quade this year, especially playing outside him all year, I can take a bit of stuff out of his game that I’ve learned this year. If I go up against him this weekend we’ll know each others’ games but it’ll be fun.
“I haven’t received anything from him yet but closer to the game he’ll probably send me a text and try to get into my head, it will be a lot of fun.
“Now that I’m here, I think the goal is now fighting for a spot to get onto that spring tour. Hopefully I get a cap for the Wallabies, that’s the ultimate goal for myself.
“If I’m going to be in contention to play No.10 I’m going to have to be leading the way, controlling the ship. I’ll have to be ordering the boys around, I really have to know my stuff even though I’m new.”
Paia’aua has risen through the absolutely meagre ranks to become the next worse option after Foley, Quade and Jono Lance. And Paia’aua, the sweet old thing, credits his mrs.
“I’ve been happy off the field, I thought too much about footy and didn’t concentrate on my outside life that much,” Paia’aua said.
“I connected a lot with my family and especially getting married to my wife this year, that’s been a big part of my growth and happiness this year. I’ve just been taking that onto the field.
“I’m loving [being married], it’s been the best time of my life.”
Naw
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Baas Beat Classics
Alan Jones’ Barbarians™ beat the Classic Wallabies in Lismore last night, 27-24. The match was played to raise funds for the Lismore Flood Relief.
The Brumbies’ Tom Banks scored the first try of the match, 1 of 2 that he’d score in total. The Barbarians went into half-time up, with Richie Arnold scoring a try, as well as Sam Greene (of Toyota Verblitz). Green also scored a double in the game.
Greene, who may be related to Bernard Foley, only scored 1 conversion out of 5.
Meanwhile the Classics hit back to Banks’ first try with a Drew Mitchell – Lote Tuqiri link up. Also in the first half, the NSW Country Eagles’ Alex Gibbon scored a full length of the field after intercepting a cutout pass.
Byron Hutchinson and Jock Armstrong scored the only other two tries for the Classics. Nick Jooste was slightly better than Greene, kicking half of his conversions.
According to the SMH, the match was free flowing, to the extent that Alan Jones would have been very happy with the boys in the sheds after the game.
“I was overall very pleased,” Jones told Fairfax Media. “We made quite a few mistakes today but that wasn’t my concern. My concern was that we really had a go with the football. We played more ball in the air than we did on the ground. We hung in in defence and they got two tries at the end but if you don’t try things, nothing will happen.
“There was a heap of kids here that I thought played very, very well. [Andrew] Kellaway had a big game.
“It [my coaching career] is very temporary, it will end at about half past four on Saturday. It’s been very enjoyable. We’ve encouraged people to believe that they’ve got more ability than they’ve been given credit for.
“I had a bit of a tight squeeze at the end but we were always in control. Sometimes you run out of time. We didn’t today.”
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