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Toomua learnt the importance of the team by not being in it

Roar Guru
21st November, 2014
10

Many Wallabies overlooked for Test selection on the spring tour so far have politely accepted it as being all part of the experience.

Centre Matt Toomua, who gets his chance against Ireland this week, hasn’t found sitting on the sidelines quite so easy to stomach.

“It’s sucked actually, I’ve hated it,” Toomua told AAP on Thursday.

“To say it’s been easy would be a lie.

“If anything, the last few weeks have taught me how much it means to me being in the team.”

Toomua’s tour story so far has been one of the more unlucky among Michael Cheika’s Australian squad.

After making the No.12 his own for the best part of a year, he’s had to play second fiddle to Brumbies teammate Christian Leali’ifano since a concussion ruled him out of last month’s loss to the All Blacks, Ewen McKenzie’s final game in charge.

The 24-year-old played in the tour-opening win over the Barbarians but has since had to bide his time with Leali’ifano retaining his spot for the win over Wales and loss to France.

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Toomua is one of a host of players being given an opportunity in Saturday’s Test at Lansdowne Road and he hopes to show he should be retained for the tour finale against England next week.

“I’ve been given a one-week contract at the moment so I’ll be trying to ensure that’s two,” Toomua said.

“There’s a lot of depth there, there’s other guys who can play in the spot but that (selection) can’t be my focus.

“I’ve got to concentrate on the process this week against Ireland and hopefully the outcome will take care of itself.

“Christian probably did play better in the All Blacks Test than I did in the ones before that but I get my shot now, which is cool.”

Meanwhile, Toomua said he had worked on changing his technique in order not to expose his jaw so much in defence and prevent further head injuries.

“But it’s kind of organised chaos out there so while you have an ideal way of trying to defend, it doesn’t always work out that way,” he said.

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