A pair of Brumbies have taken out Australian rugby\u2019s top gongs, with both Len\u00a0Ikitau\u00a0and Tabua\u00a0Tuinakauvadra\u00a0recognised\u00a0on an historic night\u00a0for the club at the Rugby Australia Awards in Sydney.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ikitau,\u00a0currently on sabbatical with Exeter in the English Premiership,\u00a0became the first centre to be awarded the John Eales medal as the Wallabies Player of the Year.\u00a0The 27-year-old enjoyed a stellar twelve months for both club and country, with the award coming months after\u00a0a season in which Brumbies\u00a0head\u00a0coach\u00a0Stephen Larkham\u00a0labelled\u00a0Ikitau\u00a0\u201cthe best defensive centre in the world\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It was his work in attack, however, that will be forever entrenched in the memories of Wallabies fans.\u00a0His flick pass in the lead up to Max Jorgenson\u2019s try at Twickenham \u2013 one which earned\u00a0him the nickname Len \u2018Flickitau\u2019 \u2013 proved a famous\u00a0moment\u00a0in Wallaby history.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Although the award is recognition of his work in the gold jersey,\u00a0Ikitau\u00a0proved one of the Brumbies\u2019\u00a0best in 2025, highlighted by his\u00a0Round 5\u00a0hat-trick\u00a0at home against the Drua.\u00a0His win also means that the last three John Eales medals have been collected by Brumbies players, with Rob\u00a0Valetini\u00a0winning back-to-back in 2023 and 2024.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ikitau\u2019s\u00a0achievement is made all-the-more remarkable by the fact that 2025 saw him shift from his usual position at outside centre,\u00a0where he stars for the Brumbies,\u00a0to\u00a0the inside\u00a0channel.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s\u00a0been an awesome journey. This is\u00a0probably one\u00a0of the best years that\u00a0I\u2019ve\u00a0enjoyed in the Wallabies jersey, in terms of the way\u00a0we\u2019ve\u00a0been playing. You know, the way that we want to play.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0just been exciting.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ikitau\u00a0wasn\u2019t\u00a0the only Brumby to taste success, with\u00a0Tuinakauvadra\u00a0becoming the youngest ever Wallaroos Player of the Year\u00a0at the age of 22.\u00a0Tuinakauvadra\u00a0\u2013 who finished second in last year\u2019s count\u00a0\u2013\u00a0became the first\u00a0backrower\u00a0to\u00a0take out the award since 2019. The award has extra\u00a0meaning, given it was a\u00a0Women\u2019s\u00a0Rugby World Cup season.\u00a0The\u00a0Orange-born powerhouse\u00a0proved a shining light for the Brumbies Women\u00a0in an otherwise difficult season.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Despite her\u00a0young age,\u00a0Tuinakauvadra\u00a0boasts maturity beyond her years, as\u00a0evidenced\u00a0by her acceptance speech.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“I think not only the little girls and boys that are watching,\u00a0but also the women that are aspiring to put themselves out there and try something new or be a part of something that can uplift them and challenge themselves to put themselves in an area where they’re not exactly comfortable,” she explained.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“I think rugby is the perfect space where you can do that. No matter the age, no matter the skill level, you can see this World Cup that we just played in…you\u00a0can do whatever you want.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“You can join the local rugby team, you can play in a team that’s majority boys, you can play in a team that won’t have many round games because of participation, and that’s fine,\u00a0but it’s for the love of the game and it’s for the bigger picture.”\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A pair of Brumbies have taken out Australian rugby\u2019s top gongs, with both Len\u00a0Ikitau\u00a0and Tabua\u00a0Tuinakauvadra\u00a0recognised\u00a0on an historic night\u00a0for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229337,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,66248,760,85],"class_list":["post-229336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-brumbies","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229336","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=229336"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229336\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}