Mark Nawaqanitawase does not play down the “massive gamble” he made. “We’re talking about a career here, I’m not a seven-year-old just picking something to play on the weekend,” he says. It has paid off handsomely, quickly.
We are talking cross-code hazards, and the flitting between the 15 and 13-man games that has prevailed throughout rugby history. Having made his Wallabies debut in 2022, played eight Tests under Eddie Jones in 2023 and then left for the NRL, Nawaqanitawase is a notable chapter. Not least because he will return to union for the 2027 World Cup in Australia.
Without his gamble, it is likely that Nawaqanitawase — all 6ft 4in and 16st of him — would be representing Australia against England this weekend at Twickenham. Instead, he will be representing Australia against England in Liverpool. As he and his league team-mates jog off at Everton’s Hill Dickinson Stadium for half-time, his former union team-mates will kick off in London.
Nawaqanitawase stands in the rain on the running track at Harrow School, where the Kangaroos had one final training session on Wednesday before heading north. Last weekend, the 25-year-old became Australia’s 49th dual-code rugby international, in the 26-6 victory over England at Wembley. It was reward for an NRL campaign at Sydney Roosters in which he finished as top tryscorer with 24 in 23 games, including one finish against Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs described as “the try of the decade”.
“The most difficult thing was probably just trying not to rush myself, trying to perfect it straight away,” he says. “I had a lot of help, which was great, but sometimes I could be a little bit hard on myself for not figuring out all the wrestling, the different kind of tactics that they use in this game. That was the hardest thing.
“Obviously, the physical side of it, getting used to the running … you’re hanging on for dear life, and a lot of the boys can attest to that as well.”
The stamina issue never gets easier, you just get better at dealing with it?
“Oh man, literally. It’s all mental.”
Nawaqanitawase is tackled by Alex Walmsley and John Bateman during last weekend’s first Test win at Wembley
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In 2022, Nawaqanitawase was a glimmer of promise in an ailing Wallabies team. His first cap was a defeat by Italy, the second a defeat by Ireland, and in the third he scored twice as Australia came from 34-13 down to end Wayne Pivac’s tenure as Wales head coach. The following year he played eight Tests under Jones but the only wins came against Georgia and Portugal as the Wallabies failed to reach the World Cup quarter-finals.
He played out the season for Waratahs at wing and full back before switching to NRL, whose lure has never been greater. His departure, as well as that of Carter Gordon, the young fly half on whom Jones bet the house and then demolished it at the World Cup, was the trickle that could inspire a flood.
It was a gamble, of course, because no one can foresee which attempts fail and succeed, but Nawaqanitawase was not a complete stranger to league. His father, Sevuloni, moved from Fiji to play for Balmain Tigers, met Fiona and stayed in Sydney, where Mark was born.
“I started with league when I was younger,” Nawaqanitawase says. “It wasn’t until I got to high school, which was year five, six — I was 11 or 12 — because once I went to St Pat’s [St Patrick’s College, Strathfield], my school was a union school, so I pretty much swapped over there and I wasn’t allowed to play league outside. And Mum didn’t like it as well, so I was not allowed to play any more.”
The Roosters made contact with Nawaqanitawase, who has also played sevens at the Commonwealth Games and in the Paris Olympics, enticed him to give the NRL a crack and now he is a Kangaroo, with his mum, aunt, uncle, nephew, two cousins and partners all at Wembley for his debut.
Nawaqanitawase was part of Australia’s disappointing World Cup campaign in France in 2023
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“I didn’t win her over, the Roosters did,” he says of his mum. “Just the way we’ve been welcomed and the way they’ve taken care of us and made us enjoy the game — all of us, and that’s my whole family. She’s loved it. It’s brought her to London again, which is pretty cool. It’s been a great experience for us.
“I’m still trying to figure it all out. It’s pretty cool because as a young kid I dreamt of playing league. I did it, which I still can’t believe. Now I’m touring with the Kangaroos. I used to watch videos back in the days of Billy Slater and the Kangaroos and Jarryd Hayne and all that running around. And now I’m one of them, so it’s pretty special.”
One could be forgiven for reading those quotes and thinking Nawaqanitawase is lost to union, yet he is set to return at the end of next year to bolster Australia’s options at a home World Cup. After an injury-affected season in NRL, comprising a solitary appearance, Gordon is already back with the Wallabies, but will not feature at Twickenham.
No one is installing the Wallabies as favourites for the 2027 World Cup, but their prospects have improved. They had the better of the second and third Tests against the British & Irish Lions last summer, albeit in a (financially rewarding) 2-1 series defeat, and backed that up with a stunning win over South Africa in Johannesburg. Though they lost four of six Tests in The Rugby Championship, they were competitive throughout.
We can trace the start of the resurgence to last November, against England at Twickenham. Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii, in whom all Australian hopes were invested, completed a reverse Nawaqanitawase from Roosters to Wallabies and excelled on debut at outside centre as Australia snatched a 42-37 win in the final play. The resurgence, Rugby Australia hope, will end with Nawaqanitawase and Suaalii wearing the same jersey. This weekend, they will be 176 miles apart.
Nawaqanitawase will be part of Australia’s league side who face England in the second Test in Liverpool this weekend, as their union cousins compete against Steve Borthwick’s men at Twickenham
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Saturday will be a salivating double dose of rugby, redolent of the pioneering excursions to Great Britain by Australian footballers in 1908-09. In a time of snow and cold temperatures, the First Wallabies and the First Kangaroos played here at the same time: the union amateurs from September to January, and the league professionals from October to March. Newspapers often reported on their fortunes together, comparing gate receipts and speed of play, and printed a challenge from the Kangaroos to their compatriots.
Between them, the tourists played 76 matches in Great Britain, often on the same day in different parts of the country, occasionally near each other: in Wakefield and Hull on November 21, and four days later in Wigan and Fallowfield, both against Lancashire.
Ernest Booth, an Original All Black who played for Leicester while reporting on the Wallabies tour as a journalist, wrote that the two groups shared a train from Wakefield to Manchester. “Many members of the two teams fraternised, and the ills and benefits of life and travelling in England were discussed in camera pretty fully, to say nothing of the politics of football and the exchanges of Xmas greetings,” Booth said. “The train should have been labelled ‘Advance Australia’, containing so many good sturdy samples of athletic manhood.”
On their return to Australia the Wallabies faced the Kangaroos and many players were banned from union, turning professional — indeed, almost half of the 49 dual-code internationals were active before the First World War. Meanwhile, in 2025, the NRL threatens a ten-year ban for anyone flirting with the R360 rebel union league. History continues to rhyme.
Saturday may be the most engrossing day of Anglo-Australian rugby since November 22, 2003. That was the day the Kangaroos sealed a whitewash in Huddersfield against Great Britain (the most recent Ashes series prior to this year) and England beat the Wallabies in the World Cup final in Sydney. That match had its own cross-code fabric: Australia had three former Kangaroos — Mat Rogers, Wendell Sailor and Lote Tuqiri — as their back three, opposite Jason Robinson.
Such is the intrigue around cross-code players that Nawaqanitawase is already being quizzed on his post-2027 plans. Regular hopping between the two? “It’s definitely possible,” he says. “I’ve obviously done both now. I don’t know, whatever the future holds. I know what the future holds for the next bit, but after that, anything’s possible.”
He knew the Wallabies were in town, but he was not aware of the similar kick-off times. “Should have just played at the same stadium after us,” he jokes. Perish the thought — or start the planning.
England v Australia
Hill Dickinson Stadium
Saturday, kick-off 2.30pm
TV BBC1