The truth about great Wallaby hope Will Skelton

There was a time, not that long ago, when Will Skelton looked like he might be filed under “great wasted talents” in Australian rugby’s bulging archive of regret.

A 6’8, 145kg-plus enigma with legs like tree trunks but whose early on-field performances never quite lived up to their outsized billing.

Big body, bigger potential, but somehow it never quite fully clicked on Australian soil.

And yet tomorrow night in Melbourne, as the Wallabies try to avoid the ignominy of a Lions series ceded inside the first two Tests – something they haven’t done since 1966 – it’s Skelton who stands in the way.

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British & Irish Lions in collaboration with the RugbyPass App

World Rugby and the British & Irish Lions announce a groundbreaking strategic collaboration that will see the RugbyPass App become the designated home of the British & Irish Lions Tour to Australia in 2025.

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Not just by physical default, but as the man with the most to offer. A multiple European champion. A second-rower forged in the white-hot fires of the northern hemisphere. A walking redemption arc.

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If there was ever a player to make the case for exporting Australia’s misfits to Europe for reconditioning, it’s him. At Saracens, he was reshaped – literally – by a brutal diet, S&C and Sarries’ famously structured systems.

“I saw him after a recent Sarries game and thought ‘that jersey is hanging off him!’,” Wallaby great Michael Lynagh told RugbyPass back in 2018. “It is unbelievable but even though he has lost weight, he is still a big man – two of me.”

By the time he landed in La Rochelle, he was no longer just a project. Under Ronan O’Gara, he became a pillar of a Champions Cup dynasty and arguably the most consistently destructive tight five forward in Europe.

Opposition – whether in European club rugby or at Test level – had to pivot their games around dealing with the giant problems he posed. And not just his big body, but his carrying and off-loading abilities.

They often failed.

“He’s just stronger than everyone else,” said commentator David Flatman during Skelton’s maul-mangling exhibition against Wales at the end of last year. “That’s what happens.”

In the northern hemisphere, Skelton didn’t just collect silverware – he gathered scar tissue, technical nous and an all-court game that had eluded him back home. By 2023, he was Australia’s World Cup captain, and while injury curtailed his influence in France, the point had been made.

Skelton wasn’t a novelty anymore. He was a necessity.

Joe Schmidt certainly thinks so. Ahead of the MCG showdown, the Wallabies head coach made it plain: this is no time for niceties.

“Will has accumulated that experience, he knows what it’s like to play these players, he plays them regularly and he’s won against them regularly in the big European games,” Schmidt said.

The Lions are circling, and Schmidt has picked a man who’s lifted cups in Newcastle, Dublin, London and Marseille – to stop the rot.

“Will is a very calm influence… his experience and his history of being involved in successful teams, I think it just gives other players confidence.”

Tom Wright summed it up without much poetry but with absolute clarity: “His resume speaks for itself.”

Indeed it does. A Super Rugby title. Two Premierships. Two Champions Cups. Skelton has tasted more champagne in Europe than the Wallabies have tasted Gatorade in the past five years.

Yet despite his standing within the game, the 33-year-old product of Hills Sports High School goes into tomorrow night’s do-or-die second Test with just 32 caps to his name. A decent haul, no doubt, but maybe one that tells its own story: the Wallabies, unlike Skelton’s European employers, have sometimes failed to see his value.

That’s certainly no longer the case, given his heralding in the Aussie press this week.

It’ll be a full circle moment for Skelton. When he first played against the British & Irish Lions as a rookie Waratah back in 2013, the gravity of the tour was a little lost on him.

“I was very raw, I didn’t understand the magnitude of the (Lions) tour as I do now with all the experience I’ve had,” Skelton said in Sydney last month. “It’s a massive, massive occasion for rugby and especially rugby in Australia … it will be the pinnacle.”

Indeed, Saturday night is no ordinary Test. It’s win or become a pub trivia footnote – the second Wallaby team in 59 years to lose a Lions series without so much as a whimper. Wallabies skipper Harry Wilson has talked about pressure being “what you love about professional sport.”

Well, here it is.

With over 90,000 expected at the MCG and an entire rugby public waiting for someone – anyone – to strike a blow for the Wallabies, it’s a player born in Australia but very much forged on the fields of Europe, that they’ve turned to.

Skelton is no longer a question mark. He’s an answer. Maybe the only one the Wallabies have got.