Why best schoolboy rugby talent can’t play for Queensland this season

The crazy spin-off to rugby union’s realigned junior pathways is that Queensland’s best schoolboy back Reesjan Pasitoa can only play for the Brumbies Academy this season rather than his state.

Nudgee no. 10 Reesjan Pasitoa scores a try vs Gregory Terrace in last year’s competition. File picture

THE crazy spin-off to rugby union’s realigned junior pathways is that Queensland’s best schoolboy back Reesjan Pasitoa can only play for the Brumbies Academy this season rather than his state.

The Nudgee College ace was shaping as the key cog in the Queensland Schoolboys line-up this season until the seismic shift to make the Under-18 Academy series the showcase of top schools talent.

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Flyhalf Pasitoa, 17, was signed by the Brumbies after last year guiding Nudgee to the First XV premiership at GPS level and emerging as the top No. 10 on the Australian Schools and Under-18s tour of Ireland and Scotland.

Reesjan Pasitoa in action at Ballymore last October. Picture: Albert Perez/Getty

Pasitoa will be in the frontline of Nudgee’s quest for a title hat-trick this year but the nine GPS schools have unanimously voted to feed players to the Reds Under-18 Academy pathway.

There’s the roadblock for the Perth-raised Pasitoa, who will be groomed by the Brumbies Academy for that competition.

“Yes, I did have Reesjan in my initial plans and I’m scouting for other No. 10s but I’m looking at the positives,” Queensland Schoolboys coach Michael Crank said.

“He’s still in rugby and has secured a pathway before rugby league did.”

The time-honoured Queensland Schoolboys pathway has been watered down.

Queensland (1) and (2) will be selected from a regional carnival at Sunnybank in early May but with no players from GPS schools or flagship AIC school Marist College Ashgrove.

Pasitoa in action in a game against TSS. Picture: Mark Cranitch.

However, Gregory Terrace, the school that produced Michael Lynagh and Tony Shaw, has broken ranks and will send eight boys to the Sunnybank carnival in the Met North side to bid for Queensland jerseys as well as a player to the Reds Academy.

“In a transition year for these new pathways, we decided to give as many boys as possible every opportunity,” Gregory Terrace Director of Rugby Tyron Mandrusiak said.

Brumbies coach Dan McKellar was delighted with Pasitoa’s first visit to Canberra during the off-season when he spent time with Wallaby Christian Lealiifano.

The addition of Under-18 players, who had already left school, for last year’s rebranded Australian Schoolboys and Under-18s touring team no longer meant younger Aussies were disadvantaged playing older northern hemisphere sides already selecting to Under-18 standards.

Both the Academy competition and the Australian Schoolboys carnival, mid-year in Sydney, will remain a window to selection in the Australian Schools and Under-18s under new head coach Peter Hewat.