Tom Wright is fresh off a hat-trick and a man of the match performance in the win over Wales, but plenty of Wallabies fans are urging him to improve one area of his game.
According to Opta stats, Wright made three line breaks and beat five defenders from his 12 carries in Cardiff, gaining 243 metres which is the most by any player against a Tier 1 nation since Jordan Larmour ran 245m for Ireland against Italy in 2018.
Opta’s run metres stats started in 2010 and Wright’s performance against Wales was the fifth best in those 14 years.
The hat-trick followed a try against England in the opening match of the tour and has Wright in the frame to emulate Mark Ella by scoring in each of the 1984 Grand Slam Tests.
But Wallabies fans can be hard markers, and Wright has been called out by plenty of them for the way he’s been finishing off his tries in the two games so far – running straight for the line or moving further towards touch instead of making a run towards the posts to ensure an easier kick for flyhalf Noah Lolesio.
On Monday, all three of Wright’s tries were finished off out wide when he could conceivably improved the angle of the conversion for Lolesio – who missed two of those three conversions.
This is how grumbling fans reacted on X.
The complaints seem overly harsh on the in-form fullback. Imagine the uproar if he sacrificed five points by trying to get too clever, and in three of the four tries his decisions might be summed up by the idiom “discretion is the better part of valour”.
For his try against England, and the first and third against Wales, he would have been aware of the cover defence and made a sensible call.
— Autumn Nations Series (@autumnnations) November 17, 2024
The @Wallabies number 15, Tom Wright, finished the game against Wales with a stunning try, timing it perfectly with the clock in the red and making it a hat-trick for Tom and an 8th try for the Australians! What a performance! ???????? #breitling @Breitling #definingmoment pic.twitter.com/sSaCuDID8g
But there does seem to be a case to answer with his second try against the Welsh (which Lolesio did manage to convert).
Tom Wright has a double
— Stan Sport Rugby (@StanSportRugby) November 17, 2024
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Wright’s impact this season has been significant after he was – let’s never forget – left off Eddie Jones World Cup squad.
“He’s on fire, isn’t he?” said former captain Michael Hooper after the Wales game on Stan Sport.
“We talked pre-game about picking his times and making sure he’s not just going to run from everywhere. Last week, we saw him run deep from his 22. We’re seeing it again against Wales. But he’s picking his time, he’s getting his balance right.
“Over the years, you’d see Tom Wright, he’d take a run, and maybe it wasn’t at the right time, and he’d put pressure on the team, and there were turnover opportunities created for the opposition.
“But it seems right now, when he does take a run or he does kick the ball, it’s all with a lot of purpose. Everything he’s doing at the moment is really purpose-driven.
“That’s a player who wants to get his hands on the ball.”
Morgan Turinui added that Wright looked assured.
“He’s making decisions quite early and sticking to them .And we’ve seen sometimes with Super Rugby, the skillful guys, when they’re coming through, have so many options in their head.
“He can kick fast and run, but I like he makes an early decision, he commits to it. And his ability to re-accelerate off the back of footwork has been outstanding the last couple of weeks.”
Tony Harperhttps://www.theroar.com.au/2024/11/20/so-frustrating-tom-wright-is-on-fire-but-wallabies-fans-are-blowing-up-about-one-part-of-his-game/‘So frustrating’: Tom Wright is on fire – but Wallabies fans are blowing up about one part of his game
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