{"id":219499,"date":"2025-10-17T05:48:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T05:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/219499\/"},"modified":"2025-10-17T05:48:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T05:48:08","slug":"carter-gordons-unfinished-wallabies-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/219499\/","title":{"rendered":"Carter Gordon\u2019s \u2018unfinished\u2019 Wallabies business"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Five days after abruptly leaving the NRL, code-hopping Carter Gordon<\/a> insists he\u2019s ready for the deep end if thrown into the Wallabies\u2019 Test side for the spring tour opener against Japan.<\/p>\n

With Gordon and Tane Edmed<\/a> the only two No.10s included in coach Joe Schmidt\u2019s 34-man squad, the one-season Gold Coast Titan will almost certainly feature against Eddie Jones\u2019 Cherry Blossoms in Tokyo on Saturday week.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf that chance comes, then I\u2019d be stoked to be able to do it again,\u201d Gordon said on Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just taking it day by day at the moment. Obviously I\u2019ve got a lot to work on, a lot to learn over the next few days.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll keep learning off Joe and Tane and, yeah, we\u2019ll just take it day by day.\u201d<\/p>\n

After joining Leicester<\/a> in the English premiership, veteran James O\u2019Connor<\/a> will likely link up with the Wallabies upon their arrival in Europe for Tests against England, Italy, Ireland<\/a> and France.<\/p>\n

But Gordon and Edmed will be Schmidt\u2019s go-to five-eighths to face Japan.<\/p>\n

Ironically, it was Jones who handed Gordon his Test debut two years ago and thrust the young playmaker into the playmaking hot seat in the ill-fated \u00a02023 World Cup campaign in France.<\/p>\n

Now the 24-year-old former Melbourne Rebels<\/a> star will likely be charged with plotting Japan\u2019s downfall as a second-half replacement in the Wallabies\u2019 tour opener.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat struck me about him when he was playing for the Rebels is he\u2019s certainly brave enough,\u201d Schmidt said ahead of the Wallabies\u2019 departure on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s not going to hold back and he\u2019s going to throw himself straight in there.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t see any hesitation (at training) today whatsoever, albeit not on a full-contact day at all.<\/p>\n

\u201c(So) Carter being the 10 in the squad, there\u2019s a pretty good chance that he may be involved (against Japan).<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we don\u2019t invest now, we\u2019re not going to profit in two years\u2019 time when that home World Cup is still a massive, massive opportunity for us to really demonstrate what we can do in the game here in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gordon admitted it was that 2027 World Cup in Australia<\/a> and \u201cunfinished business in union\u201d that prompted his return to\u00a0rugby\u00a0after just one injury-ravaged season with the Titans.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was 22 when I last played for the Wallabies and at the World Cup,\u201d said the eight-Test 24-year-old.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like I left a bit on the table and that was eating away at me a little bit.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo the opportunity to come back came up and, yeah, I\u2019m very excited to be able to take it and get back on board.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Wallabies head off as world No.7 and need to climb into the top six by the end of the tour to secure an all-important top-six seeding for the 2027 World Cup.<\/p>\n

If they don\u2019t, the Australians will not be a top-seeded side in their pool at the global showpiece and at risk of facing one of the heavyweights like two-time defending champions South Africa, New Zealand, Ireland or France<\/a> early in the knockout stages.<\/p>\n

Schmidt is acutely aware of the importance of racking up as many wins as possible on the five-Test, five-week tour.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s certainly in the back of my mind,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u201dIt\u2019s a tough (rankings) algorithm to work out. All I know is that if you\u2019re playing away from home and you beat a team that\u2019s ranked ahead of you, that\u2019s a good way to improve your ranking.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat said, we\u2019re playing two teams that are ranked below us and that\u2019s a good way to lose ranking points.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we\u2019ve got to be good against Japan<\/a> in eight days\u2019 time and we\u2019ve got to be good against Italy.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Five days after abruptly leaving the NRL, code-hopping Carter Gordon insists he\u2019s ready for the deep end if…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219500,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-219499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}