Fraser McWright’s Wallabies World Cup hopes struggle against Sam Kane’s head coaches, video, highlights,

Fraser McWright’s moment of truth has arrived as the rising winger takes on All Blacks captain Sam Kane in the weekend’s second quarter-final in Waikato on Saturday.

McWright has been Australia’s most dominant openside during the Super Rugby season, but the jury is still out on whether his game is best suited to international rugby.

Proactive and quick at the breakdown, McWright goes much harder to turn the ball over.

For the most part, he’s been deadly in that area all year.

But the cracks in his game were on display last weekend in Suva as he was booked for a series of fouls in the area early in the second half against Droua.

While Super Rugby is generally more open than the international game, the edges of the window, particularly of McWright’s size, get smaller and tighter the deeper the seasons and the higher the stakes.

That is certainly the case in the Test arena, where the defenses are stronger and the bodies are bigger.

But the payoff is huge, with David Pocock virtually single-handedly keeping the Wallabies in their 2011 quarter-final success against the Springboks.

What helped Pocock was his strong and powerful legs and rock core that allowed him to withstand the barrage of players attempting to clear.

Few in the world are quicker to collapse than McWright, but if there are concerns about whether he is resilient enough to withstand the rigors of the international arena, Eddie Jones will get a great chance to see how the 24-year-old can be feared when: he wears the number 7 jersey on Saturday.

Against an All Blacks-laden Chiefs side including Samisoni Takeyaho, Brodie Retallick, Luke Jacobson, Pita Gus Sovakula, Tupou Vai and Kane, McWright will face his biggest challenge of the year with his Reds strong side. the minor premieres of the season.

If he can turn the match around like Pocock did in 2011, where the Wallabies should have been beaten by the Springboks given the mountain of possession and territory they possessed, Jones should get the first crack at the No.7 jersey.

“Sam has captained the All Blacks for many years and he’s played a lot of games and had a lot of success, so for me it’s a great opportunity to play against one of the best and I’m really looking forward to it. that,” McWright said Tuesday.

“It’s been a good season, every year I try to get better and improve these little areas of my game that I want to work on.

“I’ve been able to play a lot of minutes this year, and for me, I’ve been able to do that week in, week out.

“We need one more result and one more performance this weekend.”

While the Reds shocked the Premier League with their first win in the trenches for a decade last month, the side Brad Thorn’s side will face on Saturday will be vastly different to the one they beat at Yarrow Stadium.

While most of the Chiefs’ back line was in place, Clayton McMillan rested his heavy artillery of Tukeyaho, Retalik, Sovacula and Kane. That meant the usual progress they make just wasn’t there.

The former Junior Wallabies skipper said the Reds need to be precise, particularly with their batting tactics, to stand a chance against the Chiefs.

“Obviously they’re going to be a different team than the last time we played them,” McWright admitted.

“Defense is very important, keeping the ball and shooting very well … for us to get results, we have to do those parts really well.”

And despite heavy underdogs, particularly after their heavy loss to Drua in Fiji last weekend, which meant they had to rely on a strength that slipped against second-placed Chiefs, McWright said the Reds were fully aware that the past is history and 80 minutes a streak-inspired effort could see them flip the script in their 5-7 season.

“The finals are a new competition,” he said.

“To finish in the top eight is great and wonderful and obviously we’re a little bit upset and heartbroken after the result at the weekend, but we can put that behind us and we can move on and we can focus all our attention on the leaders this week. »