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LA Giltinis franchise pick off another Super Rugby veteran

Angus Cottrell

The threat to Australia’s Super Rugby stocks from the United States has deepened with veteran forward Angus Cottrell to play in Los Angeles next year. Cottrell, a Wallabies squad member in 2018, will join Queensland Reds duo Ruan and JP Smith at the Venice Beach-based LA Giltinis for their inaugural season from March next year in the fourth instalment of the USA Rugby sanctioned competition.

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The 31-year-old flanker heads to the US after playing 90 games of Super Rugby for the Western Force and Melbourne Rebels.

Cottrell said he had weighed up offers from France, Japan and the United Kingdom before opting to sign with the Giltinis – a team owned by an Australian gym tycoon and named after a yet-to-be released cocktail.

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Rugby Wrap Up | Episode 22 | LA Giltinis coach Alex Corbisiero, World Tens with Nick Heath, MLR Rumours

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Rugby Wrap Up | Episode 22 | LA Giltinis coach Alex Corbisiero, World Tens with Nick Heath, MLR Rumours

“I’ve given all I can to Australian rugby for nine seasons and I’ve been thinking this last year or two of experiencing a different culture through rugby,” Cottrell said.

“I was very quick to jump at the Giltinis when the option appeared because LA is a great place to live and an amazing international city.”

Cottrell will join the Smith twins in LA after the established Super Rugby pair signed on last month.

Ex-Wallaby Stephen Hoiles is an assistant coach at the Giltinis while former Wallabies hooker Adam Freier is the team’s general manager.

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The team has also been linked to Matt Giteau and Adam Ashley-Cooper while former Wallabies great Chris Latham is coaching Utah and Drew Mitchell was poised to come out of retirement in New York before the delay.

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fl 26 minutes ago
Ex-Wallaby laughs off claims Bath are amongst the best in the world

“Yes I wrote that, because you had Leinster as the best team in the world. What was that based on - winning the URC this season?”

It was based on Leinster’s performances over the course of this season, and on their trophy. If Bordeaux beat Toulouse then I’ll change my mind and move them to first. But as it is I expect Bordeaux, Toulouse, and Leinster to all finish with one trophy each, and with Leinster having produced the best week-on-week performances of the three.


“One of those teams won the league in each of those years so yes they were worse. If I was a fan of either of those four teams I would rather have been a fan of a team that won a trophy than didn’t.”

That’s true - I would too. With regard to Stormers I think their trophy was very much enabled by the fact that they weren’t playing in europe, so were able to rest their players much more than the non-SA teams were so I’m not sure whether I would or wouldn’t consider them to have had a better season than Leinster in 2022, but clearly Munster and Glasgow (respectively) had better seasons than Leinster in 2023 and 2024. But if I was a fan of one of those 3 teams I would rather be a fan of a team that won 66 URC+CC matches over the course of 3 seasons (Leinster) than a team that won 46 (Munster) or 42 (Glasgow). If you think trophies are literally the only thing that matters, do you think Blackburn Rovers are a more successful Premier League team than Tottenham Hotspur are?


“You contradict yourself alot. Trophies matter in one post and in the same post coming second consistently makes you better.”

Its going to get really frustrating if you’re not willing to read what I write. I said: “Trophies matter. They matter a lot. But so does winning games. So does making finals.” How does that contradict my assessment that Leinster were better than Stormers?


“I doubt Leinster would say they have been the better team in any of the seasons you keep going on about.”

Teams generally downplay talk of them being the best, so that wouldn’t surprise me. But crucially I don’t think Leinster were the best team in 2022, or in 2023, or in 2024, so I’m not sure what you think you’re responding to.


“Lets make it clear though - you are the one who went on and on about previous seasons with your deep dive into la Rochelle and Stormers etc.”

Yeah - I did that because you brought up Leinster’s trophyless record from 2022-2024, so I thought that was worth responding to. If you’d like though I can stop responding to the things you say?

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