BRISBANE — Twelve years ago, on a balmy Brisbane winter’s evening, Israel Folau lit up Suncorp Stadium. On Saturday night in the Sunshine State, Australian rugby will be hoping another code-hopper can do the same.
Memories of Folau’s jaw-dropping debut and the many superb performances that followed over the next six years are largely overshadowed these days by his inglorious exit — and the damage it did to the 2019 World Cup campaign and Australian rugby at large.
Fortunately, Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii appears unlikely to adapt Folau’s off-field pursuits.
But his switch to rugby has to date been just as incredible — if not better — than Folau’s, given he went straight into a massive Test with England last November and won man-of-the-match honours having not laced a boot in the 15-player game since his schoolboy days. Back in 2013, Folau had enjoyed a full Super Rugby season.
So expectations are high that Suaalii can have a similar impact to Folau in the corresponding match from 12 years ago.
“When i saw Israel play he was a freak and some of the stuff he did both in the air and the way he carried the ball, he was a just very difficult guy to tackle,” former Wallabies captain Stephen Moore, who played in all three Tests of the 2013 Lions series, recalled of Folau to ESPN this week.
“He was a supreme athlete, scored a lot of tries; so yeah you don’t want to put that kind of pressure on Joseph, it’s very early in his career and he’s only played a couple of Tests. But what he has done so far, particularly in that Test at Twickenham last year, has showed that he can play really well on the big stage.
“That’s a big arena, Twickenham, in front of 80,000-odd people, but he took to that really easily and he won’t be overawed by the occasion, he’s played in plenty of big games. And i guess if you look at the last 12 months, the key for us is to just keep him on the field and make sure he’s a key part of our game week to week.
“We need him to play all three Test matches and play well, and there’s a bunch of other guys in that category.”
Wallabies fans will recall Folau first scooping up a Will Genia grubber and beating Jonathan Davies to the tryline to give the Wallabies a 7-0 lead over the Lions after just seven minutes of the first Test in 2013.
He would deny George North with a desperate piece of cover defence later in the first half, and then rounded out a sensational first 40 by standing up Jonny Sexton and skipping past Leigh Halfpenny to score his second try. Folau was box office.
Australia would ultimately go on to lose a gripping first Test — Kurtley Beale’s late penalty attempt fell short and wide after the fullback slipped on his approach. But Folau’s impact on debut had been huge, putting him on a course to becoming the highest-paid player in Australian rugby a couple of years later.
Suaalii has already achieved that mantle, and by some margin, following a record three-and-a-half year deal worth a reported $5.4m that was brokered for the most part by former Rugby Australia chairman Hamish McLennan.
But Suaalii is earning his keep, on and off the field, and now gets the chance to impact the series he says was a key reason as to why he turned his back on the NRL and the chance to win a premiership with Sydney Roosters.
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“That was probably the biggest carrot for myself,” he said earlier this week. “These are the biggest games, they happen only every 12 years, so that was probably the biggest thing coming across.”
One of Suaalii’s most valuable attributes is his ability in the air, just like Folau, but something the Wallabies didn’t utilize in their unflattering win over Fiji. That may have had something to do with Australia not wanting to expose a few, or most, of their best plays before the facing the Lions, but the tourists will be on red alert after Suaalii created all kinds of headaches for England at Twickenham last year.
That performance repaid Wallabies coach Joe Schmidt’s faith, and then some, and the Kiwi is hoping that a little more of that magic can reappear on Saturday – and maybe even better Folau’s first crack at the Lions.
“I’ve watched that replay a few times. I’d love to see that,” Schmidt said of Folau’s Wallabies debut. “I think Joe [Suaalii] is still bedding himself in a little bit, still finding his feet. But he’s a very, very good athlete.
“If athletes like that can be brought into the game, and obviously we’d love to get them in the game early, then whether he creates something special or … one of the things I thought he did really well when he first came in and played his first Test match is he facilitated opportunity for others as well.
“I think that’s the mark of [first], an unselfish player, but also a player who is able to athletically contribute individually but also complement teammates around him.”
It is a heavy burden to carry, particularly at 21, but that is the responsibility that comes with such a price tag. The exposure, opportunity and riches could grow exponentially if Suaalii is able to replicate Folau’s heroics and Australia win the series, when the Wallabies of 2013 could not.
Achieve that, and the delicate footholds the Wallabies laid under Schmidt last year could grow into something special, which is what the game Down Under has craved for more than 20 years.
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“You’ve already seen the tendencies and the sort of the bars around the game in the tour so far, but these Test matches are really where the rubber hits the road for the Australian public,” Moore told ESPN when asked of the significance of the next three Saturdays for Australian rugby.
“Most people will be watching the Tests, you know the people who don’t normally watch rugby will tune in on Saturday night and watch the Test match. And if we win and we play well, we make our fans proud, and they’ll come back and watch again.
“And if we don’t then things will continue on as they have been which has sort of been pretty mediocre for the most part for a fair while, so we’ve got to shift gears in order for things to get better. And the boys have got the opportunity now to go out there and do that in the next three weeks.”
If Suaalii is smiling when the fulltime hooter sounds on Saturday, odds are the Australian rugby collective will be, too.
