Rugby World Cup 2015: Stephen Larkham admits Wallabies still battling halves conundrum

THE Wallabies are edging closer to finalising their best RWC team, but Stephen Larkham admits they are still in the dark about their best halves pairing.

Wallabies Training

WALLABIES backs coach Stephen Larkham says the very rough outline of a selection plan for the Rugby World Cup is taking shape but the identities of Australia’s best halves pairing are not yet known.

The Wallabies have played four Tests this winter and fielded four very different teams, and Larkham indicated the chopping and changing will continue for the side to play against the USA in their final warm-up game on September 5 in Chicago.

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Will the wallabies go with the Waratahs halves pairing of Bernard Foley and Nick Phipps at the RWC? Picture: Mark Evans

Several key players who’ve had big workloads this year are set to be rested, and others will be given the chance to work their way into the Wallabies side to meet Fiji in the opening World Cup game on September 23 in Cardiff.

“It will be good to try a few combinations we haven’t tried this year,” Larkham said.

One area the Wallabies coaches are not decided upon, Larkham said, is the halves. Specifically which combination of halfbacks Nick Phipps and Will Genia, and five-eighths Bernard Foley and Quade Cooper, will be trusted with the reins.

“We are not sure of the order yet ... we have a fair idea of who we want to go with but we still have a little bit of training to get to, and a game against the USA, before we finalise our team there,” Larkham said.

Cheika gave assurances last week that despite it looking like the Wallabies coaches didn’t know what their best team is, they are working to a firm plan.

At least part of that plan appears to be dealing with the “awkward” opening weeks of the Wallabies’ World Cup, where they’ll play three Tests in 11 days: against Fiji, Uruguay and then England.

“The rough plan at this stage is to play our best team against Fiji... the team we want to play against England against Wales. With a view to putting other guys on the paddock against Uruguay,” Larkham said.

“The problem for us is it's a Wednesday game to a Sunday game to a Saturday game. It is a fairly awkward start to a World Cup for us. We have to manage that well. So we need to make sure our combinations are right for Fiji because they are a bit of an unknown.”

The danger of constant changes to a Test side is that the side permanently unsettled, and key playmakers lose confidence without tenure. Some can lose rhythm when not consistently in the driver’s seat.

Quade Cooper at wallabies training. Picture: Mark Evans

Larkham — who admitted he was one No 10 who like “time in the seat” — said the balance in value between change and consistency in selections was something they’d also have to figure out in coming weeks.

“It will be along those lines of trying to get our combinations right, but what we have done this year is put the best guys on the park for each game and haven’t really worried about combinations, and I think that’s worked well for us as well. So there are certainly some things to weigh up before we get to the tournament about our selection policy going into it,” he said.

Larkham said Cooper’s performance against the All Blacks in Auckland showed he still had the ability to lead Australia well on a desired game plan, and that upon review, the maligned playmaker had only made two mistakes in the game.

“(The high tackle) was quite significant in the wash-up of the game... but apart from that and we have specifically spoken about the first 25 minutes as being very dominant, from our perspective and we were very happy with the way we played,” Larkham said.

“If you look at Quade’s performance in the first 25 minutes he was instrumental in making us play we wanted to play, and throughout the rest of the game we didn’t have a lot of ball.

“He was very clear with the boys out on the field and his skills were where they needed to be. We have given him a chance, He has been out of this environment for a number of years with injury and hasn’t had consistent Super Rugby and hasn’t had consistent Test matches since 2011.

“Getting him back in the squad and having a bit of time to work with him he responds really well to that.”

Originally published as Rugby World Cup 2015: Stephen Larkham admits Wallabies still battling halves conundrum