Cokanasiga dubbed the ‘next Lomu’
England’s Wallaby-slaying wing Joe Cokanasiga has been anointed as the new Jonah Lomu after destroying Australia’s defence in their 37-18 victory at Twickenham yesterday.
The 21-year-old Fiji-born finisher- who grew up idolising Lomu- reached into the late, great All Black wing’s playbook with a power-packed try in the second half.
Cokanasiga - in only his second test bumped off Wallabies wing Dane Haylett-Petty on his unstoppable run to the line in the 55th minute at Twickenham. It revived memories of Lomu scattering English defenders on his way to four tries in the All Blacks’ 49-25 trouncing of England in the 1995 Rugby World Cup semifinal.
Mike Tindall, a World Cup winning former England midfielder, marvelled at Cokanasiga’s brute force.
“It was like watching Dane HaylettPetty run into a brick wall as he tried to stop Joe Cokanasiga,” Tindall said on BBC Sport.
After Cokanisaga was stopped just short of the line in a desperation tackle by Wallabies captain Michael Hooper, the BBC drew a Lomu comparison. “Shades of Jonah Lomu as Joe Cokanasiga takes a kick up near halfway, swerves the first chaser and stampedes towards the line with a clutch of green and gold shirts hanging off him like water-skiers behind a motor boat,” the BBC Rugby website blog reported. Doc R, a blog respondent, wrote: “Joe Cokanasiga is the new Jonah Lomu”. Cokanasiga was born in Fiji but moved to England as a three-year-old when his father joined the British Army.
He is 1.93m tall and 118kg. Lomu was 1.96m and 120kg in his playing prime. Cokanasiga made his professional rugby debut with London Irish in 2016, but now plays for Bath, coached by exAll Blacks captain Todd Blackaddere. When Cokanasiga was first selected for England’s under-20s at the start of last year, he cited late All Blacks great Lomu as his hero and said he looked up to former New Zealand winger Julian Savea and four-time England international and Bath team-mate Semesa Rokoduguni, who was also born in Fiji. Eddie Jones gave Cokanasiga his debut against Japan last weekend, saying: “He’s got power and he’s got pace, there’s something a little bit special about him”.
Cokanasiga scored on debut and now has two tries in two tests.
I’M STILL THE MAN: CHEIKA Embattled Wallabies coach Michael Cheika maintains he’s still the man to take Australia to the World Cup despite falling to a ninth defeat of a miserable 2018.
Cheika’s side sank to a 37-18 loss —their joint second biggest against England — in a game where they were largely second-best at Twickenham. The defeat was Australia’s ninth in 13 matches and despite it being a year to forget, Cheika insisted there are still reasons to be optimistic.
“I love footy and you can’t just have the good bits,” he said. “Everyone wants the good bits nowadays. ‘My phone’s busted, throw it away and get a new one.’ “You’ve got to have the bad bits. You don’t want to have them but when they occur you’ve got to live them and own them. “There’s no law that says you can’t feel sad or feel pain because that’s what’s happened to us this year.
“We’ve felt sad often and we’ve felt pain often. We will use that when we come back.”
RESULTS
Wales 20-11 South Africa, All Blacks 66-3 Italy, Scotland 14-9 Argentina, Ireland 57-14 USA, France 14-21 Fiji, England 37-18 Australia,