Ben Donaldson has allegedly been dropped from the Wallabies squad ahead of their crunch matches against the All Blacks in rounds five and six of the Rugby Championship.<\/p>\n
The 26-year-old is reportedly \u201cgutted\u201d to be missing out on the final round of matches, with Joe Schmidt calling him earlier today to give him the bad news.<\/p>\n
The Western Force star has been a key member of the Wallabies squad for the past three years, but has been overlooked for the upcoming matches, as the Australian head coach looks elsewhere.<\/p>\n
Schmidt has elected to stick with the young prospect Tom Lynagh<\/a>, despite his dubious form in the gold shirt, while also sticking with Tane Edmed after gifting him the starting berth against Argentina last weekend.<\/p>\n Also reportedly in Schmidt\u2019s plans is the vastly experienced James O\u2019Connor, who gets another crack at the whip after an assured return to international duties.<\/p>\n Springboks squad: Winners and losers as the \u2018backbone\u2019 of Rassie\u2019s World Cup squad \u2019emerges\u2019 after Willie le Roux snub<\/a><\/p>\n O\u2019Connor to \u201cfly under the plane\u201d<\/p>\n James O\u2019Connor made it pretty clear that he intends to complete the Rugby Championship<\/a> with the squad, telling\u00a0the\u00a0GBRAUNZ\u00a0podcast on Monday: \u201cI want to, I\u2019ve made it pretty clear that I want to play. Joe\u2019s still talking with Leicester at the moment,<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll bloody do what my dog\u2019s doing and fly under the plane to get back.<\/p>\n \u201cI land Tuesday, England time. Me, the missus and the dog are all on the same flight but he stays over for an extra day.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll pick him up on Wednesday, head up to the new house, get settled in and then I\u2019m more than happy to fly straight back.\u201d<\/p>\n Billy Proctor faces calls to be dropped<\/p>\n