Ioane doesn’t feel too bad for Cooper
DASHER Digby Ioane believes the Reds will regret ditching Quade Cooper yet he’d happily grab his divorce settlement as Australia’s highest paid park player on $500,000 a year.
The invasion of Brisbane by 300 top players for Friday’s kick-off to the Global Rugby Tens at Suncorp Stadium only magnifies Cooper’s curious isolation because he has no role.
Berrick Barnes agreed that Cooper’s limbo in Brisbane club rugby was a strange case for a 70-Test figure when he landed with Japan’s Panasonic Wild Knights.
New Queensland coach Brad Thorn cut Cooper adrift from his squad in December to pursue a new direction at five-eighth but the Reds must continue to pay his hefty contract.
Like Barnes, Ioane is a former Reds and Wallabies teammate of Cooper.
Winger Ioane called the situation “a bit sad” but through text exchanges realised Cooper was “in a good head space” and forging on with hard training. “I feel for him,” Ioane said. “I guess he’s the most expensive club player in Australia.
“I’d take that job ... that should be me because it would be easier on the body when you’ve had 15 surgeries.
“It’s just weird because it’s not like experienced fiveeighths are falling from a tree in Australia.”
Added Barnes: “If I was him I’d stay playing club rugby ... it’s the greatest gig in the world.
“He’s signed his deal, the Reds owe him that deal and the ball is in his court as to what he does with his future. He’d do well up in Japan but it’s hard when most clubs have signed their (international) players (for next season).”
The Wild Knights are a true wildcard after upsetting the NSW Waratahs and Melbourne Rebels last year to reach the Tens quarter-finals.
Wild Knights coach Robbie Deans has drilled them with more Tens strategy than most teams and speedsters like Japanese flyer Akihito Yamada are renowned tryscorers.
“I think the Wild Knights will do really well because all the Japanese boys love the fast footy and we are just coming off our season,” Ioane said.
Playmaker Barnes, 31, said the new day-night format on Friday and Saturday was a winner to beat the heat.
Barnes said there was “a growing fever” around rugby in Japan with next year’s World Cup and the Bledisloe Cup Test in Yokohama on October 27 would be a hit.
He also predicted the Wallabies would enjoy not being suffocated by the trappings of a World Cup Japanese-style.