Barnes rolls ankle, grand slam tour in doubt
Berrick Barnes is unlikely to know before the weekend whether he will miss the Wallabies’ grand slam tour of the UK and Ireland after being ruled out of Saturday’s Bledisloe Cup Test against the All Blacks with an ankle injury.
In a massive blow to Australia’s chances of avoiding their first 4-0 series whitewash against New Zealand since 1962, Barnes was rushed to hospital in Tokyo on Thursday for emergency scans after hearing a crack when he rolled his left ankle at training.
Initial fears were allayed when x-rays later cleared the newly-appointed Wallabies vice-captain of a fracture.
But the Australian team’s medical staff say Barnes probably won’t know the full extent of his injury until the swelling subsides in the next 24-48 hours.
It was hoped he had not suffered major ligament damage, which would almost certainly rule Barnes out of the Wallabies’ first grand slam tour in a quarter of a century.
“If it’s just a ligament injury in isolation, it might be just a couple of weeks. He will stay with us if it’s a two or three-week injury,” Wallabies coach Robbie Deans said.
“If it’s syndesmosis, that’s more sinister.”
Should he be sent back to Australia, it would be a devastating personal blow to the 23-year-old midfield general, as well as a huge setback to the Wallabies’ prospects of completing a grand slam sweep of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Barnes lasted less than 20 minutes of last year’s spring tour of Europe before breaking down against Italy in Padova with a knee injury that required an early flight home.
The Wallabies have already sent young outside back Rob Horne home this week after he suffered a recurrence of his chronic hamstring injury, with Brumbies centre Tyrone Smith joining the squad on Thursday.
More immediately, Barnes’ scratching from Saturday’s Test prompted Deans to reshuffle his backline, promoting teenager James O’Connor to start at fullback and moving Adam Ashley-Cooper to inside centre.
Quade Cooper has replaced O’Connor on the bench, while star five-eighth Matt Giteau will assume the vice-captaincy.
The Wallabies were confident they could overcome the disruption, but also naturally disappointed for the luckless Barnes.
“I hope he’s alright,” winger Digby Ioane said.
“I heard he’s going to be alright in two weeks, but I’m not sure. I hope he comes back as soon as possible.
“It is a big loss because he is the go-to man, along with Matt Giteau. They can mix it up and change between five-eighth and 12.
“But Coops is dangerous on the ball. He’s more of a go-forward man; he can break the line and stuff, whereas Barnesy’s more of a ball player, a smart player.
“The good thing about us is we’ve got some depth. We’ve got guys like Coops who can play anywhere and there’s a lot of boys in that situation.”
Ryan Cross, who will now partner Ashley-Cooper in the centres, said while Barnes’ withdrawal would change the dynamics of the Australian backline, and prompt some tactical changes, he was confident the Wallabies would recover.
“We’ve been training well and everyone’s ready to go. Obviously you don’t want this to happen but hopefully we can adapt,” he said.
“Berrick and Gits share the load a bit so it’s going to be up to the rest of the backline to take up what Berrick was doing.
“Adam’s got a bit of a kicking game and James O’Connor’s pretty good there, so we’ve still got options there.
“Hopefully it won’t change things too much.”
Wallabies: James O’Connor, Peter Hynes, Ryan Cross, Adam Ashley-Cooper, Digby Ioane, Matt Giteau, Will Genia, Wycliff Palu, David Pocock, Rocky Elsom (capt), Mark Chisholm, James Horwill, Ben Alexander, Tatafu Polota-Nau, Benn Robinson. Replacements: Stephen Moore, Matt Dunning, Dean Mumm, George Smith, Luke Burgess, Drew Mitchell, Quade Cooper.
© AAP 2012
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LeftArmSpinner said | October 30th 2009 @ 5:38am | Report comment
i would have put O’Connor at 12, his long term position. He has played lots of 12 outside giteau. he can tackle and would need to when Nonu comes achargin’.
AAC is a blunted force at 12 and we need him at his best and most influential. I dont suggest that he will give anything other than 100%.
While barnes is a big loss, it will back the team further into a corner. Will they lash out and play some rugby or lie down submissively and humbly?
sportym said | October 30th 2009 @ 8:40pm | Report comment
The biggest waste here is AAC at 12. I would argue that this is his weakest position, and he has been exposed there is defense cause he does not play there in S14 or wallabies generally. AAC in fullback is solid. I am loosing faith in Deans by the day, it is one thing to have a go at players who give up, but picking a team to fail is not better. O’connor is no 15, the All blacks are going to have a field day… Absolute rubbish selections by Deans.
cinematic said | October 30th 2009 @ 6:11am | Report comment
O’Connor on the field in any position is good news for the AB’s.
CraigB said | October 30th 2009 @ 7:08am | Report comment
riddle me this batman… JOC play 12 for the Force outside M Giteau AND inside Cross. His form in said position was good enough to warrant Wallabies squad selection. Then having made that squad, selectors pick him to play 15. While there he has played badly, particularly against the AB’s. He gets dropped to the bench, then the incumbant 12 gets injured. Instead of replacing him with another 12 who has played with both the 5/8 and 13 ALL YEAR at S14 level, we instead put JOC back to fullback and play our previously selected fullback at 12 which is probably is his weakest position. EXPLAIN!!!!
cinetmatic – of course it is when you play a bloke out of position all year. I can say the same about Carter as long as they play him in the tight 5 or McCaw playing on the wing…
Greg Russell said | October 30th 2009 @ 11:46am | Report comment
The traffic at 12 in international rugby is considerably heavier than in S14 rugby (because the players are bigger and game-plans are more confined), and Deans obviously thinks O’Connor is too defensively frail to handle this traffic. After all, Ma’a Nonu will be the opposite 12.
That said, I agree with your comment Craig. I would take the risk and play O’Connor at 12, hoping that the positives (as pointed out by you) outweigh the negatives. If the worst came to the worst, one could try to “hide” him on defence by swapping him with AAC at 15. This is an old ploy, which in fact was first developed by Deans himself at the Crusaders, where he would swap Mehrtens (10) and Leon MacDonald (15) in defence.
Hammer said | October 30th 2009 @ 1:56pm | Report comment
“The traffic at 12 in international rugby is considerably heavier than in S14 rugby (because the players are bigger and game-plans are more confined” …. what Nonu doesn’t play S14 then – or does he just get bigger for internationals ..
fox said | October 30th 2009 @ 3:12pm | Report comment
Ha ha. My thoughts exactly.
Lazlo said | October 30th 2009 @ 7:10am | Report comment
The Wallabies haven’t lashed out in years. They haven’t been submissive either, just dumb.
Agree with you about JOC at 12. AAC is the best FB we have, and Gits is the best centre we have. Naturally, neither of them ends up playing in their best spot. But then the team is coached by a guy who played Smith at 8 when Eddie Jones showed the world that it wasn’t a wise move.
Justin said | October 30th 2009 @ 7:26am | Report comment
Agree with all the posts above about JOC being at 12. How farkin thick is Drongo? I have just about had enough of his selections, he couldnt pick his own a$$
Nicol'arse said | October 30th 2009 @ 12:33pm | Report comment
Beautifully said J-bird. Here, here mate!!
Bill said | October 30th 2009 @ 7:25am | Report comment
Couldn’t agree more CraigB. O’Connor has shown he is out of his depth playing at fullback in internationals especially against the ABs. Alternatively playing him at 12 with his Force teammates beside him seemed a logical solution to the Barnes injury.
fox said | October 30th 2009 @ 7:38am | Report comment
LAS et al, I agree! AAC is not a 12 and O’Connor is the closest we have to a second ball player. He’s accustomed to the positioned, played well there outside Gits (and inside Cross) at the Force, so much so that he was heralded as one of our outstanding players in the competition, and is clearly labouring at fullback. Then again, the final selection has not been made. Robbie, you still have some time to intervene with some common sense. Don’t waste it!
Harry said | October 30th 2009 @ 7:51am | Report comment
Agree 100% wih the comments above. I am now very pessimistic for the Wallabies on Saturday and in Europe.
This crazy notion of O’Conner at 15 – despite the clear evidence, and the stated desire of the boy – that 12 is his best position, is causing massive damage to the Wallabies and to, lets not forget, a potential superstar in JOC – I believe he has the potential to be as good as and have an illustrious career as Tim Horan. But he is being incredibly badly handled by the Wallabies.
There were 2 clear and indisputable lessons from Wellington:
1) The Wallabies need to attack the breakdown in greater numbers, and generally harden up.
2) JOC is NOT a test quality fullback.
The ABs game plan and areas where they can attack weaknesses isn’t going to be to hard to figure out … they’ll need big whitebaords in the NZ dressing room. Let us hope we keep it close. I for one will be relieved to hear the usual losing piffle afterwards about “heading in the right direction” and “can’t fault the effort”. Happy if we lose by 10 points or less and stay competitive and in the match for an hour at least.
Pete said | October 30th 2009 @ 12:08pm | Report comment
JOC is not a test quality number 12 either. I hardly think its the place to try him for the first time at 12 opposite Nonu. If he failed he’d never get back up again. At 15, although I agree his Welligton performance was poor, he knows what to expect and will deal with it accordingly. I’d rather AAC tackling Nonu than JOC (at this point in his career). I hate the idea of swapping positions based on attack/defense. If there is a sudden change in play, everyone is out of position.
Justin said | October 30th 2009 @ 12:36pm | Report comment
For all those saying JOC wont be able to handle Nonu, are you sure with the defensive patterns in use he will be his man? I would think that Gits will be covering Nonu alot with Pocock taking Carter, particularly from set piece.
Pete said | October 30th 2009 @ 1:56pm | Report comment
Good point. I pity who ever has to mark Nonu. Lets hope he (Nonu) has a bad hair day and decides not to run out…
Sylvester said | October 30th 2009 @ 9:14pm | Report comment
You’d expect the defence to slide up and out, especially from set piece as you say. However, that’s a relatively small part of the game compared to open phase play, and you’d expect Nonu to be targeting him in all no set piece situations. In saying that, there’s so much gang tackling I doubt he’d be left too isolated anyway.
Armchair-critic said | October 30th 2009 @ 8:15am | Report comment
This injury severely ruins the balance of the Wallabies..
Without Barnes the midfield seems frail
I think the choice to go with AAC would be based more on defence than attack. Particularly given Cross’ weaknesses in defence. I just think that with Carter and Nonu running at that channel AAC is a safer option than JOC. He provides a bit more presence and strength. Perhaps they could switch on attack?
Harry said | October 30th 2009 @ 8:22am | Report comment
Just to remind you Armchar Critic, the last time AAC and Cross played as centres – a supposedly strong defensive unit – the Boks carved us up through that channel and scored 2 easy tries. Yet what happens? Deans put them together again … why doesn’t our highly paid coaching staff pay heed to this?
Armchair-critic said | October 30th 2009 @ 8:30am | Report comment
Harry was just about to edit that into my comment!!
However, I would still be inclined to have AAC in the front line of defence ahead of JOC and i dont really have a reason why..
My first choice would actually be to put Quade Cooper at 10, Giteau at 12 but that would be asking a lot of Cooper.
I would even be happy with Cross at 12, Ioane at 13 and JOC on the wing.
Either way the side is going to be far weaker than with Barnes in it.
Harry said | October 30th 2009 @ 8:34am | Report comment
I would have JOC at 12 for the weekend test. He’s actually pretty strong and a good defender one-on-one…. as distinct from Beale and Cooper (defensive capability), defence is bothe these players major weakness. And at least there is a hint of combination there from the Force days … we just can’t expect these units to jell instantly.
Will be watching with trepidation.
Rah Rah Rasputin said | October 30th 2009 @ 8:44am | Report comment
Agree with Armchair. I wouldhave thought Quade would of been next off the list at flyhalf/ inside centre. In terms of attack, I thought he would have posed a few problamos for the AB.
BUT the original make up of the bench does suggest that o’connor was cover for barnes/ giteau. He is even list on the ARU website as flyhalf/ centre.
Why nto just play him there? Is Deans that worried about Nonu? The article in the Australian woudl suggest so.
I’d rather see o’connor there then at fullback. I wonder what position he has been trainiing for in the B team?
Virgil said | October 30th 2009 @ 9:00am | Report comment
Devastated. Bloody devastated.