Tuesday’s rugby news has Quade Cooper’s return delayed, Palu added to Wallabies injury list, Larkham goes to the US and Pietersen replaces Pienaar.
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Quade’s Return Delayed
Quade Cooper is not expected to return to the Wallabies until the end of year tour. Cooper is still recovering from shoulder and hip surgeries. A two month delay means that Cooper has ruled out making a comeback for the final Bledisloe test against the All Blacks in October.
Before returning for the Wallabies, Cooper is expected to play in the later rounds of the National Rugby Championship for Brisbane City.
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Palu Added to Wallabies Injury List
Wallabies number 8 Wycliff Palu has been advised by the Wallabies medical staff to take a break from the next two matches due to lingering concussion symptoms.
Palu joins a list of Wallabies who will not be going on the tour to Argentina and South Africa. Peter Betham has re-injured his ankle which hampered his Super Rugby season whilst Henry Speight has had his Wallaby debut delayed with a stubborn hamstring injury.
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Larkham Goes to the US
Brumbies coach Stephen Larkham has gone to the US and will join Dan Palmer and Clyde Rathbone to host coaching clinics and to learn some winning secrets from some NFL teams.
“We’re going to try to get to a couple of NFL franchises … The universities have good set-ups over there, as well, so I think we can pick up good ideas. We’ll look at the NFL training – their facilities will be totally different and we’ll look at the way they coach. If we can get behind the scenes we can pick up little things to help us get better.” Larkham said
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Pietersen Replaces Pienaar
JP Pietersen has been recalled into the Springboks squad in replace of injured halfback Ruan Pienaar. Pietersen was unable to play in the first four rounds of the Rugby Championship due to his commitments in Japan.
“JP has always been part of our plans and did very well in June playing at outside centre … We have got two scrum-halves in Francois Hougaard and Cobus Reinach and decided it would be better to bring in an outside back.” said Springboks coach Heyneke Meyer
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