Squad selection made with World Cup in mind
WAYNE Pivac has named an intriguing 33-man squad to face South Africa this summer, making a number of big calls.
Among them is the decision to drop the in-form Jac Morgan and Jonathan Davies from the squad, and retain Dan Biggar as captain, despite Alun Wyn Jones’s presence in the squad.
The Wales boss has named two uncapped players in his squad in the form of James Ratti and Tommy Reffell.
He sat down with the media after naming his chosen 33 to explain his decisions. Here is some of what he had to say...
Question: People thought there might be more of a refresh of the squad; is this a more cautious approach?
Wayne Pivac: There is a bit of a refresh with the likes of George North coming back in. There are some players that have been out of the game for
a little bit of time that are pretty near.
We looked long and hard at the performances in the Six Nations and we’ve got the World Cup in mind, which is now only 15 or 16 months away.
There is a bit of looking ahead to the big stage of the Rugby World Cup, we’ve invested a lot of time in players over the last few years.
It’s a juggling act of who we think deserves to be there on form and also thinking ahead to what we’ll need at the World Cup. It’s a combination of things.
There are some players clearly unavailable through injuries as well.
Q: Is this the end for Jonathan Davies?
WP: No. I’ve had a good chat with Jonathan. He was unavailable through injury when we first came in after the last World Cup. He’s had some big injuries in his career and he’s come back each time, worked very hard to get back into the squad.
We had a chat around him having a big off-season now with next season being a huge one for everybody, obviously. We wanted to bring George [North] back in.
We explained that Nick Tompkins is playing well and Owen Watkin did a very good job in the Six Nations, particularly defensively.
So it was really an opportunity to have a look at Johnny Williams, who is back from injury. We know pretty much everything we need to know about Jonathan. It’s a case of him getting himself ready to go for a big start to next season to push for the autumn and beyond.
Q: So it would be wrong to write him off?
WP: We certainly haven’t written him off and that’s what I’ve told him. He knows that form will be really important at the start of next season leading into those first internationals.
Q: Could you talk about the uncapped players?
WP: James [Ratti] we had a good look at during the Six Nations. He’s a young guy that worked very hard, who applied himself and did everything we asked him to do. He just didn’t get the opportunity because we didn’t think he was quite ready then.
With injury and some form that he’s shown in recent weeks, we believe he deserves an opportunity. You’ll see we’ve picked two 7s, two 8s and two 6s.
Q: Alun Wyn Jones is in the squad but isn’t captain. Could you explain the thinking there?
WP: We’ve said it before, whenever you write Al off he comes back to prove people wrong. He hasn’t had a lot of rugby and we had a good conversation around the topic.
Al is a leader by the way he trains and performs on the park, he has done that for many years. We don’t expect that to change. He’ll come in focused on his role, playing to the best of his ability and then we’ll go from there in terms of selection and see how the four second rows shape up.
In terms of Dan, we felt he did a good job and those guys have played many Test matches together. They’ll share the role, no doubt, throughout training and the working week.
Q: Is the decision over the captaincy an indication that you’re managing Alun Wyn through to France?
WP: There are many senior players in the group who we will be looking to manage, and that’s working with the clubs not just in our environment.
Al has played three games since the Italy game so he hasn’t had a lot of rugby. He’s had an illness thrown in there as well.
He’s a little bit underdone so he’s got six weeks or thereabouts to work hard, and get back into the shape that he knows he can get into and we know he can get into.
I’m sure there’ll be some interesting training sessions ahead.
Q: Has the pressure on the squad intensified after the Italy defeat?
WP: Yes, and as you would expect the most pressure for us, and we say this as coaches all the time, comes from within.
We’ve had some robust discussions as a coaching group. We let the dust settle a bit because emotions were running pretty high right throughout the country, and rightly so because that’s a result that nobody is proud of.
We didn’t expect that, and we have to take it on the chin. The big thing is we had those robust discussions, we’ll learn as much as we can from the experience, and hopefully it makes us a better side moving forward.
Certainly that’s the attitude we are taking. But yes, it was a tough period.
What we want to do is turn that frustration, that emotion if you like, into the hard work that’s required going to a place like South Africa.
Q: Did the criticism after that game hurt?
WP: No, personal criticism doesn’t hurt because it’s a job you know where everybody is watching your every move. When you take these positions on you know there’s a responsibility that goes with it.
Certainly a loss to Italy was something that wasn’t in my thoughts process, to be honest, without sounding arrogant. I believed we were good enough, we’d done enough work, and we should have won that game.
We could have won that game several times over. The fact is we didn’t so you take what comes with that, and a lot of it is justified.
Q: Will Josh Adams be fit for the first Test (on July 2)?
WP: Yes. He’s in good shape. From the club update about a week ago, he’s out running, he’s running well, and our medical team have had the handover from the Cardiff medical team.
He’ll be in the running with us from day one, and we expect him to be in full training, and available for the first Test.
Q: Same question regarding Will Rowlands.
WP: Yes, he’s recovering really well. I did hear out of the Dragons maybe even this weekend. That suggests to me he’ll be right for the camp and fine for the first Test.
Q: This is the smallest Wales squad you’ve ever named; is there any significance in that?
WP: It’s the second largest squad to leave these shores on a summer tour, I think up until the NZ tour where they threw the Chiefs game in. There was an extra game so they took a few more players than we are taking but it’s been 31 up to that point.
From our point of view 33 replicates the Rugby World Cup so it’s good preparation for our coaching group, our management group, to work with that number away from home.