LONG READ How do Australia fit both ‘fetchers’ in side? Could ‘McZano’ be next ‘Pooper’ combo?

If there’s one common thread that can be traced through Australian rugby since the dawn of professionalism, it’s been the continual line of genuinely world-class, on-ball openside flankers.

It might even extend well beyond the advent of professionalism in the 1990s, if we’re honest, but there’s no denying the lineage since the game turned pro.

It starts with David Wilson in the late 90s and quickly moves to George Smith in that period Australian fans knowingly refer to as the ‘Golden Years’, a period that hasn’t really been replicated since. Annoyingly.

Alongside Smith, there was current Rugby Australia CEO Phil Waugh, and David Pocock, now a Senator in the Australian parliament, followed soon after that. Michael Hooper wasn’t too far behind, and now it’s Fraser McReight. With the possible exception of Waugh to Pocock, most of those reigns have overlapped to some degree. And there’s been other notable contributors along the way, too: David Croft and Liam Gill, to mention two.

During those overlapping periods, discussion and consideration and selection converged at times, resulting in two of these great opensides starting Tests together.

Smith and Waugh. Pocock and Hooper. And the Wallabies might be entering another period of overlap.

McReight and Tizzano.

As he did against Italy in Perth last month, Carlo Tizzano has relished another opportunity to start a Test match. Against Japan in Townsville, he was phenomenal at the breakdown, winning three outright pilfer penalties, while also being among the Wallabies’ top ball-carriers and tacklers.

Tizzano has fast become the kind of on-ball threat that you’re better off either avoiding completely, or forcing him to make the tackle in the first place.

Though he’s a regular starter for the Western Force, he’s only started eight of his 16 Tests, and almost always when McReight is being load-managed – be that coming off the bench or rested completely.

But after such an eye-catching performance in Townsville, Tizzano’s stocks are only rising.

The three ruck turnovers won were outstanding both for the technical and physical accuracy involved, but also for the time in the game they occurred. Japan didn’t have a lot of opportunity to build attacking phases in Australian territory in the second half especially, and much of that was because of the timing of Tizzano latching onto available ball.

Even better might be the lessons he’s learned from past experiences. We only have to go back to Tizzano’s near thing in the second Lions Test in Melbourne to know how fine the margins are when it comes to these turnover penalties won. The pain from that one moment is still real; we can all feel it.

But watch Tizzano now and take note how many times he’s penalised in the same situation? I’d wager it’s way less than was the case last year. With another year’s experience and a really strong showing through Super Rugby Pacific this season to hone split-second adjustments to his timing, Tizzano has fast become the kind of on-ball threat that you’re better off either avoiding completely, or forcing him to make the tackle in the first place.

On Saturday in Townsville, there were those three turnovers won and not one penalty conceded. His timing was excellent and the decision-making around when to hold off and when to latch on was spot-on.

And when McReight did get onto the field with around 15 minutes to play, one of his first actions was to win a pilfer penalty of his own, almost as if to serve as a reminder that his powers are just as strong over the ball. That was a turnover won that screamed, ‘I’m still here’.

‘Is there a world where we see a Wallabies team without an out and out No.7? You pick tall timbers in a back row and don’t have a McReight or Tizzano?’

The interesting part of this is that it all comes at a time when teams are flirting with the idea of playing a bigger back row for physicality, which has lessoned the need for a true fetcher in the No.7 jersey. More and more players around the field these days – hookers, locks, centres, wingers included – have become adept at winning a ruck turnover, and it’s certainly no longer the exclusive domain of the openside flanker.

Through the Six Nations this year, we saw No.8s like Ben Earl and Caelan Doris starting Tests for England and Ireland respectively in the No.7 jersey. The All Blacks really haven’t had a true on-baller since Sam Cane finished up, with the likes of Ardie Savea, Ethan Blackadder and latterly Luke Jacobson playing on the open side. None of their breakdown work was compromised by any of these selections.

Indeed, only last week on Stan Sport, Morgan Turinui floated the idea of Australian coach Les Kiss trying a similar idea.

“Is there a world where we see a Wallabies team without an out and out No.7?” he wondered out loud on Between Two Posts. “You pick tall timbers in a back row and don’t have a McReight or Tizzano?”

It wasn’t to advocate for any massive overhaul of the Wallabies game plan, just a flow-on from a broader discussion about things Kiss would or should be looking for as he embarks on his grand plan of having the Wallabies firing ahead of the Rugby World Cup on Australian soil next year.

Michael Hooper, part of the aforementioned long line of great Wallabies opensides, was, perhaps surprisingly, in strong agreement of the concept.

“Well, who got the steal early in the match (in Osaka)?” he pointed out. “McReight is one of the best jacklers in the game, but he didn’t come up with one for the match. Josh Canham did. He got one of the big turnovers. Tom Wright did.

“It’s the tackle that’s often so important to leading into the player getting over the ball, and we’re seeing second rowers be a lot better at that, at stealing. I see, certainly, a world against South Africa or France… where you would pick a massive back row.”

To wrap it up, Turinui threw up some names: “You could go [Will] Skelton and Canham (in the second row), and then [Jeremy] Williams, [Tom] Hooper and [Rob] Valetini, or something like that, just as a change-up.

“It’d be interesting. We’ve always just picked the out-and-out seven, but we’ve never really looked at it differently.”

And that’s certainly true. The concept of the No.7 ball thief is about as ingrained in the mythical ‘Australian way’ of playing rugby as running the ball at all costs.

And maybe Tizzano and McReight were watching Between Two Posts, and thought, ‘hang on, we can’t let this stand!’ Their performances, within an otherwise excellent back-row performance, were certainly a timely reminder of the value of being able to turn defence into turnover opportunity.

It’s probably enough to kill the idea of not playing a fetcher dead before it’s even had a chance to become a broader discussion.

For now, the Wallabies have two truly outstanding openside fetchers at their disposal and the challenge is quickly becoming ‘how do we fit both of them in the team?’

It’s a hell of a problem for Les Kiss to navigate.