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Opinion
Nathan Cleary and Harry Grant pairing up at the Kangaroos reminds me of another couple of young stars nearly two decades ago who seemed to have instant on-field chemistry.
Just like Johnathan Thurston and Cameron Smith when they teamed up together at Origin level with Queensland in 2005 and then with Australia a year later, Cleary and Grant have got the chance to forge a similar combination as Australia’s long-term halfback and hooker combination.
Smith and Thurston barely missed a match for the Maroons and Australia for more than a decade and I can see this current pair having a long, successful career for the Kangaroos.
We thought Cleary would work well with Cameron Munster in the halves and he’s got a ton of experience linking with Isaah Yeo at lock for the Panthers and the Blues and he’s also played plenty of footy with James Tedesco at fullback for NSW.
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But it’s been really surprising is how well he worked in synch with Grant in the big win over Scotland in the group stage and they will get their chance to do that again with Harry likely to play most of the match, if not the full 80 minutes, against Lebanon with Ben Hunt having a rest before the semis.
Kangaroos legends Johnathan Thurston and Cameron Smith after winning the 2013 World Cup in England. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
In game situations and at training, they look like they’ve been playing together for years at this World Cup even though they come from different NRL clubs – Penrith and Melbourne – and are opponents when it comes time for State of Origin.
They’ve got the pedigree and you can just tell when blokes come together and they become good mates really quickly that they’re on the same wavelength.
Hunt and Daly Cherry-Evans, as the senior players in their position, have already had a really positive influence over them and will continue to keep them on their toes not just in this tour but over the next couple of years at least.
It was an extremely tough choice for Mal Meninga to pick Cleary ahead of Cherry-Evans for this weekend’s quarter-final against the Cedars.
Mal said it reminded him of the Steve Mortimer vs Peter Sterling battle on the 1982 Kangaroo Tour and Ricky Stuart vs Allan Langer eight years later.
Back then those players drove each other to bring out their very best and that’s what’s happened this time around.
(Photo by Jan Kruger/Getty Images for RLWC)
They’ve both come up with plenty of line break and try assists, their defence has been strong, they’ve been talking well on the field to direct the team around and they have quality kicking games. We really couldn’t go wrong either way.
Mal’s mindful of the prestige of being the Kangaroos halfback and may want DCE to have a role to play for the rest of the tournament.
Cleary’s like everyone else – he’s got to maintain his high standards. Everyone who’s not in the 17 this week knows they’re only one poor performance or any injury away from getting recalled to get a job done.
They’re all in the selection conversation for the next couple of weeks.
(Photo by James Gill – Danehouse/Getty Images)
Cleary has clearly got top-notch credentials having been Penrith’s halfback for back-to-back premierships and performing well for NSW over the past few years.
While we respect the Lebanese team and won’t be taking them lightly, we have one eye on the game next week and making sure everyone is right for that clash with what’s likely to be the Kiwis, assuming they also win their quarter-final against Fiji.
Reagan Campbell-Gillard is out this week with a corked thigh but he’s the kind of big body type we’re going to need against New Zealand along with Pat Carrigan, Tino Fa’asuamaleaui and Lindsay Collins coming up against some monsters in Nelson Asofa-Solomona, Joe Tapine, Jesse Bromwich and Jared Waerea-Hargreaves.
(Photo by Jan Kruger/Getty Images for RLWC)
We need to be mindful of the kind of team we need to play against the Kiwis and also give the combinations a chance to get more game time together, such as Jack Wighton and Valentine Holmes on the right edge, mixing in with Cleary and Liam Martin.
The old cliche is you’ve got to take it one game at a time but we’ve got one eye on this week and one on the next.
It’s probably flown under the radar a bit but this is the least-experienced Kangaroos team for a long time.
From the team that will run out in the quarters, there’s only two guys who have played 10 or more Tests – DCE on the bench with 17 and Valentine Holmes on the wing, who’s now up to 16.
If you look at the side that won the last World Cup in Brisbane in 2017, we had Test match experience across the board.
Cameron Smith, Billy Slater, Cooper Cronk, Josh McGuire, Aaron Woods, Matt Gillett, Boyd Cordner and Tyson Frizell were all in double figures for Tests under their belt by the time Australia beat England in the final. And in the case of the first three, 30 or more games in the green and gold each.
It’s a unique set of circumstances for this squad given that we didn’t play Test footy for the best part of three years because of the COVID-19 pandemic so we’ve relied on players with big-match experience from Origin and NRL finals games instead.
(Photo by Michael Steele/Getty Images)
Even though most of the current Kangaroos team only have a handful of Tests each, a lot of them have at least three or four Origin series on their resume.
The only member of our squad who hasn’t played Origin is Campbell Graham and he’s been one of our best, especially last weekend when we beat Italy 66-6.
Graham, Cameron Murray and Isaah Yeo were probably our most impactful three players. Yeo’s link work at lock means he’s getting the starting lock spot for the quarters but Murray played strongly as well, getting more minutes than we had planned due to RCG’s injury but he will be important for us in these next few knockout fixtures.
Even though the scoreline says it wasn’t a close game, the match against Italy was great for us to get some competitive footy.
They were quite willing and physical for the full 80 minutes when a few of the other minnow nations last weekend fell away badly in the second half of their games in some huge blowout results.
The Italians tried a few trick shots and we’re expecting to see Lebanon come up with some unorthodox tactics against us.
They’ve been going with short kick-offs and drop-outs, Adam Doueihi came up with a 40-20, Mitchell Moses kicked for Josh Mansour on play three in good-ball.
We’ve only given up two tries from kicks so far so we’re very happy with how our defence is shaping up as we get towards the business end of the tournament.
Kangaroos team to face Lebanon on Friday night (Saturday 5.30am AEDT)
1 James Tedesco (c)
9 Josh Addo-Carr
13 Patrick Carrigan
2 Daly Cherry-Evans
14 Nathan Cleary
15 Lindsay Collins
17 Angus Crichton
18 Tino Fa’asuamaleaui
19 Campbell Graham
20 Harry Grant
4 Valentine Holmes
21 Liam Martin
8 Latrell Mitchell
7 Cameron Munster
11 Cameron Murray
16 Reuben Cotter
5 Jake Trbojevic
10 Jack Wighton
24 Isaah Yeo
Michael Hagan is a former dual-premiership winning first grade player and current assistant coach of Australia's Kangaroos team. Hagan played 183 games for Canterbury and Newcastle and represented Queensland five times. He transitioned into a successful coach and took the Knights to a premiership in his first year in charge back in 2001. He went onto coach 205 NRL games and six times for Queensland in Origin.