Wallabies to welcome back Polota-Nau for Bledisloe

The blow of losing Tevita Kuridrani for the Rugby Championship has been eased for the Wallabies with veteran hooker Tatafu Polota-Nau to be on deck for the opening Bledisloe Cup in Sydney.

Coach Michael Cheika said Polota-Nau would re-join the Australian squad early next month, after missing the June series against Ireland to rest up after a long English season.

"At this stage we are planning for him to be good to go in the first Bledisloe," Cheika said.

“It will help a lot, and help with our depth, although to be honest I was really happy with our three hookers - Brandon, Tolu and Folau - over the June period.”

Polota-Nau now plays for the Leicester Tigers but qualifies for the Wallabies under the Giteau Law, due to his 82 Test caps.

The 32-year-old will be a valuable injection of experience for the Wallabies, particularly with news emerging that 58-Test centre Kuridrani will miss three months due to a pectoral injury.

Having played his way back into the Wallabies with a dominant performance for the Brumbies against the Waratahs, Kuridrani tore a pec muscle tackling Taqele Naiyaravoro in the 78th minute. He’ll have surgery next week. 

It was a stroke of rotten luck for the 27-year-old, given he was a certainty to replace Samu Kerevi, who is also out with a ruptured biceps.

Cheika is now left scrambling for man to fill the unlucky 13 jersey, and Reece Hodge and Curtis Rona are the likely options.

With the Waratahs the only team left in the Super Rugby competition, Wallabies squad members will gather in Sydney next week to begin training for the Rugby Championship.

Though there aren’t more teams in the finals, Cheika said he was pleased with the efforts of the Australian teams in Super Rugby and increased fitness and skills levels would benefit the Wallabies’ winter.

“Physically they were in better condition and the skill work was good too, if you watch the quality of the derby games in particular, they’ve been excellent in the intensity,” Cheika said.

“Maybe just mentally we didn’t manage the last little bits of important games and also the last little bit maybe of Melbourne’s season. Three opportunities to get in the finals and they just had to nail it, and they weren’t able to. And I suppose thats something we are working on as a whole.”

“From a physical perspective the fitness levels have been much better than what they were last year. It allows us to have much better lead-in to the Test series in June and then again coming now in August.”

Cheika said in past years the Wallabies squad had to do “a pre-season in the middle of the year” to increase fitness, which saw them start slow and peter out at the end.

“We have been very focused on changing our trajectory this year,” Cheika said.

“We started at a better level even though I still have a bag over my head after the results in June. But we definitely started better and our level of play was better, and so too our physicality. And we were able to do that because we were at the right fitness level. 

“That’s going to hold us in good stead leading into game one of the Rugby Championships and right through to the end of the international season at Twickenham.”

Asked if Wallabies fans could go into the Bledisloe Cup with optimism, Cheika said: “Definitely. We go into every series with optimism. Authentic optimism.”