{"id":110385,"date":"2025-09-03T01:11:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-03T01:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/110385\/"},"modified":"2025-09-03T01:11:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T01:11:10","slug":"drew-mitchells-biggest-worry-over-joseph-aukuso-suaalii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/110385\/","title":{"rendered":"Drew Mitchell’s biggest worry over Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Former Australia<\/a> wing Drew Mitchell<\/a> has responded to speculation that Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii<\/a> could shift to full-back to cover for the injured Tom Wright<\/a> against Argentina<\/a> this weekend by raising concerns that the Wallabies are \u201cgoing to keep chopping and changing him too much\u201d.<\/p>\n

While his brief Wallabies career to date has seen the 22-year-old primarily deployed as an outside centre, he has been used as a full-back for the NSW Waratahs, but Mitchell would rather he was allowed to \u201cgrow into\u201d his role in the midfield.<\/p>\n

Joe Schmidt does need to find someone to plug the hole at full-back left by Wright, who faces a long spell out with an ACL injury. But Mitchell would prefer Andrew Kellaway<\/a> to start in the No.15 jersey rather than a backline reshuffle.<\/p>\n

Mitchell\u2019s former team-mate Adam Ashley-Cooper<\/a>, however, is keen on the idea of Suaalii changing positions ahead of the clash with the Pumas<\/a> in Townsville in round three of the Rugby Championship.<\/p>\n

Fixture<\/p>\n

Rugby Championship<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Australia <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Argentina <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d like to see him at the back, I just think it will grow his game as a No.13 \u2013 because we all know he\u2019s going to end up there,\u201d Ashley-Cooper said on RugbyPass TV\u2019s Kick Offs and Kick Ons. <\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI think there\u2019s a lot of growth opportunity for Joseph to maybe be at the back, and also it would get his hands on the ball in a lot more space. Something that we\u2019ve struggled with over the last four or five Tests is the aerial pursuit, defusing the bombs, so winning the aerial game.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s not on our full-backs, it\u2019s on our 10s,\u201d Mitchell replied. \u201cSo Joseph being at full-back won\u2019t negate where we\u2019ve been struggling because the 10s are still going to be back there.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just worried that we\u2019re going to keep chopping and changing him too much.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s only one change \u2013 Wright out, Kellaway in. Whereas if you put Joseph back there, there\u2019s another couple of changes. Probably [Len] Ikitau will go from 12 to 13, Hunter Paisami<\/a> to 12, so there are three changes. They\u2019ve just started to establish their rhythm together.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would just keep him at 13. It\u2019s a topic that we always talk about \u2013 where\u2019s his best position? He\u2019s gone from 13 on the first spring tour, then to full-back at the Waratahs, then 13 with the Wallabies, now he\u2019s maybe going back to full-back. There\u2019s just a lot of change.<\/p>\n

\u201cJordan Petaia as well. When he came in, no one knew where to play him, and he didn\u2019t find a home. He\u2019s now come back and playing in Perpignan, people still don\u2019t know if he\u2019s a 13 or a winger or a full-back because he just never had long periods of time in one position. Sometimes I think you\u2019ve just got to bite the bullet and say this is his position and let him grow into it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matt Giteau, meanwhile, stressed the importance of getting the former NRL star involved more.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cI do think we need to find a way to let him have more impact. He\u2019s not really changing a game the way a marquee probably should in these Tests. He\u2019s still been good, and he\u2019s solid in his game, but I would like to see more out of him with the ball.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe we just need to change that first phase picture a little bit, where we can get him involved more.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Australia wing Drew Mitchell has responded to speculation that Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii could shift to full-back to cover…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110386,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-110385","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-rugby","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110385\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}