{"id":705802,"date":"2026-05-31T06:47:36","date_gmt":"2026-05-31T06:47:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/705802\/"},"modified":"2026-05-31T06:47:36","modified_gmt":"2026-05-31T06:47:36","slug":"super-rugby-2026-western-force-vs-nsw-waratahs-match-report-highlights-jake-gordon-achilles-injury-news-video-reaction-scores","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/705802\/","title":{"rendered":"Super Rugby 2026: Western Force vs NSW Waratahs match report, highlights; Jake Gordon Achilles injury news, video reaction, scores"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jake Gordon is believed to have ruptured his Achilles tendon after the NSW Waratahs<\/a> stalwart went down with a non-contact injury in Perth on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

The Wallabies<\/a> halfback took off from a quick tap late in the first half against the Western Force<\/a> but didn’t get far as his right leg gave way.<\/p>\n

The popular 32-year-old was immediately in distress as the apparent severity of the injury began to sink in.<\/p>\n

Watch the 2026 Super Rugby Pacific finals with every match streaming live and on demand on the home of rugby, Stan Sport<\/a><\/p>\n

\"There<\/p>\n

There are serious injury fears for Jake Gordon.\u00a0Stan<\/p>\n

“It’s a question mark around an Achilles there so, yeah, shattered for Jake,” Waratahs coach Dan McKellar said.<\/p>\n

“No-one cares about NSW and the Waratahs more than Jake and just for him to do it in the last game of the season, before the Test season’s about to begin, yeah, disappointing.<\/p>\n

“He’s a tough little bugger, very resilient sort of character. But over the next period of time he’ll have his moments no doubt. We’ll make sure we look after him and get around him. He’s a loss, yep, he’s certainly a loss, he’s got so many qualities to his game that, yeah, it’s unfortunate.”<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Moana Pasifika sign off with stirring upset, beautiful hymn<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Arsenal hearts break as PSG win penalties thriller<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Bellamy fears star is out for a month after unlucky injury<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Waratahs<\/p>\n

Waratahs coach Dan McKellar.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

His former Test teammate Nic White was only metres away watching on the HBF Park sidelines for Stan Sport.<\/p>\n

“Jake’s had, for the last little while, kind of awareness in that Achilles,” White said.<\/p>\n

“I’m too close to it but that’s gut-wrenching.”<\/p>\n

\"There<\/p>\n

There are serious injury fears for Jake Gordon.\u00a0Stan<\/p>\n

White then went to speak to Gordon at halftime.<\/p>\n

“Unfortunately, it sounds like he’s done his Achilles,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Said it felt like a weird sensation down there as soon as he took off. He’s pretty gutted. I don’t know what much more to say there boys. I’m pretty gutted.”<\/p>\n

\"Jake<\/p>\n

Jake Gordon of the Waratahs reacts.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Ex-Wallabies outside back Cameron Shepherd was similarly concerned.<\/p>\n

“So sad for Wallabies halfback Jake Gordon,” Shepherd said.<\/p>\n

“Let’s keep everything crossed that’s not as serious as it looks. I find those ones that are innocuous like that, especially when a player’s just on their own, they’re the hardest ones to watch…<\/p>\n

\"Jake<\/p>\n

Jake Gordon of the Wallabies celebrates scoring a try with Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

“His first impressions and feelings are probably pretty close to the mark, but until a scan’s done on something like that, you’re never going to know the severity of it.”<\/p>\n

If Gordon’s fears are confirmed then his 2026 season will be over.<\/p>\n

The Wallabies kick off their year against Ireland in Sydney on July 4.<\/p>\n

Gordon has played 37 Tests and has been Joe Schmidt’s preferred starter at No.9.<\/p>\n

There are other strong options, however, with Tate McDermott (Queensland Reds) and Ryan Lonergan (ACT Brumbies) at the top of the list.<\/p>\n

The Waratahs also lost forwards Pete Samu and Miles Amatosero to injury in the first half.<\/p>\n

Inspired by doubles to Dylan Pietsch and Carlo Tizzano, the Force won 31-25 as the rain intensified in the second half.<\/p>\n

Flanker Tizzano is now level with Shepherd as the Force’s all-time leading try-scorer in Super Rugby.<\/p>\n

“I might start crying,” Shepherd quipped in commentary.<\/p>\n

\"Carlo<\/p>\n

Carlo Tizzano of the Force celebrates a try.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Neither side were able to qualify for the top-six Super Rugby Pacific finals.<\/p>\n

The Force (7-7) finished seventh – their best result in 12 years – while the Waratahs (5-9) wrapped up another dismal campaign in eighth.<\/p>\n

“We’re very aware that the results haven’t been good enough,” NSW captain Matt Philip told Stan Sport.<\/p>\n

“But we’re going to have a really good look at it, put our best foot forward, train hard, and then be better next year…<\/p>\n

“I can never fault the boys’ effort, you know, they tried hard for 80 minutes there. Same with the whole season.<\/p>\n

“Trained hard, played hard, but our execution in areas let us down, and that’s not good enough in this competition.”<\/p>\n

McKellar, who is contracted for one more season, continued to call for patience and was confident he would keep his job.<\/p>\n

“We’ve had our opportunities to be significantly further ahead of where we are and we haven’t taken them. So there’s nothing else other than disappointment,” he said.<\/p>\n

“You’ve got to roll with the punches. Times like this make the good times feel even better and they’ll come. We’ve got a group here that are buying into what we want to do.”<\/p>\n

SUPER RUGBY PACIFIC QUALIFYING FINALS<\/p>\n

FRIDAY JUNE 5<\/p>\n

Hurricanes (1) vs ACT Brumbies (6): 5.05pm kickoff AEST at Hnry Stadium, Wellington<\/p>\n

SATURDAY JUNE 6<\/p>\n

Crusaders (3) vs Blues (4): 2.35pm kickoff AEST at One New Zealand Stadium, Christchurch<\/p>\n

Chiefs (2) vs Queensland Reds (5): 5.05pm kickoff AEST at FMG Stadium Waikato, Hamilton<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jake Gordon is believed to have ruptured his Achilles tendon after the NSW Waratahs stalwart went down with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":705803,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-705802","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\/705802","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=705802"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705802\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/705803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=705802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=705802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=705802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}