Hulking Irish wing Stockdale reveals Fijian legend he saw as role model

Jacob Stockdale must think this international rugby stuff is a bit of a lark.

The hulking Irish wing is yet to lose a match as an international and what’s more, he’s smashing try-scoring records as he goes.

He’s the first player ever to score seven tries in a single Six Nations campaign and has now scored eleven tries in just nine appearances for Ireland – already more than Simon Zebo or Luke Fitzgerald.

7? – @JacobStockdale is the first player ever to score seven tries in a @SixNationsRugby campaign. Superstar. pic.twitter.com/Mtu3XLNR6A

— OptaJonny (@OptaJonny) March 17, 2018

In fact to find a wing that has try scoring rate as high as the Ulsterman’s, you probably be better off looking to players of Pacific Island heritage that have togged out for New Zealand and the Wallabies over the decades.

Speaking with Stockdale after the match, RugbyPass asked the powerhouse wing was there any player that he modelled his game on growing up and he was quick to name-check a Fijian Rugby great.

“Funnily enough it’s Rupeni Caucau (Caucaunibuca),” said the 21-year-old. “I remember watching tribute videos and highlights of him whenever he was playing.

“He’s probably a slightly different style player to myself but he was always one that I loved to watch.”

Despite only winning seven caps for Fiji, Caucaunibuca is widely considered one of the greatest talents to ever play the game. His club career was a tumultuous one, with stints at the Blues, Toulouse and Agen; but no one that played with or against him ever questioned his almost impossible combination of power, speed and skill.

England’s World Cup winning centre Mike Tindall once described him as “the best player I have ever played against” while Scotland’s Chris Paterson said of the mercurial winger that: “He can be the world’s best player, the type who can win a game almost on his own.”

The 6’3, 104kg Irish man might not be cut from a different cloth in a physical sense to the 5’10, occasionally 115kg Fijian sensation, but they certainly share at least one in thing in common – both are pure rugby ‘box office’.