Beale to show colours Call for England to keep cool heads
OITA: An untimely lapse in offfield discipline robbed Kurtley Beale of the chance to wear the Wallabies’ indigenous jersey at Twickenham last year but the veteran fullback will don it with pride at the World Cup against Uruguay today.
Australia will wear the strip at Oita Stadium for the first time at the global showpiece and only the third time ever.
Aboriginal Australian Beale, along with fellow back Adam AshleyCooper, was forced to miss the England test last year after the pair breached team protocols.
He said yesterday he was glad to finally get his chance to show off the mainly green strip that represents the country’s 700,000 indigenous Australians.
‘‘It’s definitely a symbol that we’re all behind. It’s galvanised us, bringing us together.’’
Indigenous athletes are heavily represented in rugby league and Australian Rules football but only 14 have played for the Wallabies in the team’s 120year history. — Reuters TOKYO: England will give everything it has to match Argentina’s physicality today but it also plans to show something of a stiff upper lip in the face of what it expects to be a fiery and emotional Puma side.
England coach Eddie Jones said said yesterday his players would have to keep their cool and avoid being dragged into a heated battle.
‘‘I think you have got to be smart. Rugby is a tough, physical game and the passion and pride come out in the toughness whenever you play,’’ he told media at Tokyo Stadium.
‘‘They base their game on the scrum ... so you have got to take them up front, which is the scrum, the maul, the ruck attack and ruck defence. That is where it is going to be won.
‘‘But then there is also emotional control because when you have a lot of passion and pride it tends to multiply your strengths and multiply your weaknesses. We obviously want to multiply our strengths and attack their weaknesses.’’
England’s chief weakness latterly has been an inability to stem the tide when rivals get up an emotional head of steam — seen most notably in this year’s Six Nations in the 2113 defeat by Wales in Cardiff and in Scotland’s comeback from 310 down to draw 3838 at Twickenham.
The ‘‘new England’’ Jones has spent almost four years honing needs to find a way to be calm and calculating and trust that its power and skill will bring it through.
‘‘Argentina play with a lot of pride, a lot of passion and this will be multiplied by the fact that they are in a game that is very important for them,’’ Jones said. — Reuters