George Gregan has praised Michael Hooper’s “courageous” decision to step away from the game and believes Australia’s most experienced captain of all-time will find his groove once again at international level on the Wallabies’ upcoming spring tour.
Hooper addressed teammates on Tuesday in Sydney, 11 weeks after making the difficult decision to fly back to Australia from a Wallabies tour of Argentina.
The Test centurion decided he wasn’t in the right “mindset” to lead the team and took a short break from the game.
Hooper was a welcome sight at Wallabies training on Wednesday, hours before the team departed for Europe ahead of fixtures against Scotland, France, Italy, Ireland and Wales across consecutive weekends to round out this year.
James Slipper will captain the team on the tour as Hooper eyes off a return in a gold jersey for the first time since mid-July.
Gregan, Australia’s most capped player who led his country on 59 occasions, is full of admiration for Hooper.
Michael Hooper returned to the Wallabies fold before the team flew out to Europe this week. Credit:Flavio Brancaleone
“That just epitomises Michael Hooper,” said Gregan, an ambassador for Sage, who have helped introduce a brand-new smart ball that will be used in Australia’s upcoming Tests.
“The fact he put his hand up and said he wasn’t right, that was really, really important. It was courageous. It sends a very good message. He’s in a position where if he’s not 110 per cent, he’s going to put his hand up. He empties the tank every time he plays. That’s the way he prepares too. He’s an incredible leader.”
Gregan says Hooper relinquishing the captaincy for these upcoming five Tests was the right call and feels it will allow him to focus solely on his rugby.
“I think it’s a nice way for him to just get back in,” Gregan said. “He can get back to doing what he does and find his Test match rhythm, which I think he’ll pick up pretty quickly.
Michael Hooper and George Gregan in 2014.
“He’s always going to lead. ‘Slips’ has done a very good job and he has good experience. I’ve always said you need five to six leaders in your team.
“Captains have to front up and do a lot of the media work and be there for the coin toss. I’m not saying it’s that simple being a captain, but when you’ve got wonderful leadership spread across your team, it certainly takes that burden away and I think that’s the case here.
“Whoever is going to be captaining that Wallaby team has a really good group of players who are starting to get a lot of Test matches under the belt.”
Barring a disaster on the spring tour, coach Dave Rennie will remain as Australia’s coach until the next year’s World Cup in France despite a win record of 38 per cent since he took over in 2020.
Wallabies coach Dave Rennie has the backing of Rugby Australia ahead of next year’s World Cup.Credit:AP
Rugby Australia chief executive Andy Marinos said this week the expectation was that Australia would win more matches on the tour than not.
Gregan said Australia, ranked ninth in the world heading into their tour, needed to win the big moments.
“I’m pretty black and white when it comes to sport. You get moments which you have to deliver on. If you don’t win those big moments then you’re on the wrong side of the ledger,” Gregan said.
“Dave Rennie wants his team competing hard and you can definitely see that with that comeback against New Zealand in the first Bledisloe Test match where they were down with 15 minutes to go. Forget how it ended, that showed a lot of character. That to me epitomised to me any team that Dave Rennie’s coached.
“[Rennie] has got a winning mindset and that’s got to be embraced. He’s got a great coaching staff and the players just have to want to win the big moments. They want to get over the line. You’ll get those opportunities again, you’ve got to start converting them.
“It’s a big Test match tour isn’t it. A five-week tour heading into a World Cup is a very good thing.”
2022 Spring Tour Fixtures
Wallabies v Scotland, October 30, 3:30am AEDT at BT Murrayfield, Edinburgh
Wallabies v France, November 6, 7am AEDT at Stade de France, Paris
Wallabies v Italy, November 13, 12am AEDT at Stadio Artemio Franchi, Florence
Wallabies v Ireland, November 20, 7am AEDT at Aviva Stadium, Dublin
Wallabies v Wales, November 27, 2:15am AEDT at Principality Stadium, Cardiff
Watch all the action from the Wallabies’ Spring Tour with every match streaming ad-free, live and on demand on Stan Sport. Kicks off this Sunday with Scotland v Wallabies from 3:10am AEDT.
