Will Robbie Dean's Bubble Burst As First Real Test Looms?

The Wallabies have named what appears to be their full strength team for the first big assessment of the season, facing only the fifth team to win in New Zealand since 2000.

On this result, expectations are high that the French will provide a stern test for Deans, who remains firmly entrenched as the darling of the Australian media.

One only has to look at the team that was rolled out to play the Italians in the second test in Melbourne. 

Here was an opponent outside the top ten nations of the world; it is in the early into 15 match international season, you want to try your less experienced players, and some of the big names such as Captain Stirling Mortlock needed a rest. 

So why not make 16 changes to your match day squad, and wield out probably the weakest—in terms of experience—Australian test team in modern history.

Only 20,280 souls turned up, and there were a host of reasons that were not rugby related that could explain what the ARU said was a poor crowd.

Socceroo’s had just played in Melbourne, Victoria is in the middle of a pandemic, or both are a flooded sporting market.

Most indicative though, according to most theorists, including the ARU, was that it was Italy, who was soundly beaten in Canberra, and was not going to draw a crowd.  In comparison to say the 2010 Bledisloe test in Melbourne. 

This is a moot point, as on pure numbers, an All Black Wallaby clash guarantees “full house” signs.

But no one mentioned the fact that Deans himself had actually treated the Italians with a small measure of contempt by happily rolling out the second tier Wallabies (Australia A should be playing in the Pacific Nations, not in a test match), and in essence, did what his boss John O’Neill had said last year must  never happen again.

A midyear test with under strength test teams.

But didn’t Deans do this?

Could some of Melbourne have stayed away because it was a weak Wallaby team?

If another international test coach had done this, home or away, eyebrows would be raised.

So France will try, being close to full strength, and pull off an unlikely test triumph against the Wallabies.  They are at the end of a long season, have been on the road for over a month, and have just toured statistically the most difficult rugby country to play in.

Les Bleus clearly hold the Australians in high regard, and if you believe French assistant Emile Ntamack, claim that the Wallabies are a better team that the All Blacks.

But any French rugby aficionado will tell you that there is no team they would rather beat than the men in black, so the questions going into the Sydney test is simple.

Will the French repeat their documented history, and arrive on the turf on ANZ stadium with no mental edge after performing in a big match?  Have they already exceeded their expectations on this tour?  Will the sight of Gold jerseys opposite them inspire them as does the grim pallor of black?

For all and sundry, we hope that the same France that tore into New Zealand executes the same ferocity on the Wallabies.  It will benefit all parties if this is the case.

Les Bleus will, if they win, return home with an Australasian slam, something very few if any Northern teams could ever hope to achieve.  It will also be the turning of the proverbial corner for Marc Lievremont, who has still to convince as a saviour of French running rugby.

The Wallabies though, whatever the result, will be able to be far more thoroughly assessed by all concerned.  They have been untested in three matches so far, plain and simple. 

Even the All Blacks, who have had vulnerability revealed in the last month, may destroy any debate about their mixed form if their under strength team defeats Italy more handsomely than the Wallabies did.

Yet for no apparent reason, many are claiming that this Australian team is on the verge of greatness.  Perhaps they are, but results are the final caveat on such a statement.

The question of depth is disputable but for now irrelevant, because the Wallabies first XV appears to be the match of any team in world rugby.

In the backs, they are served by their twin foils of Matt Giteau and Stirling Mortlock.  Both men are on current form the best in the world, with perhaps only an Irish captain laying argument to the latter.

When Rocky Elsom returns from injury, they will have the former Leinster hard man and George Smith—easily two of the top five flankers in world rugby.

And of course, they have Deans, no doubt the most decorated domestic coach in world rugby, but still, both in his time as All Blacks assistant and as Wallabies head coach, still cannot lay claim to be a messiah at international level.

In 2009, surely as things stand, at least two out of the Tri Nations, Bledisloe or Grand Slam must be won.  Or otherwise the bubble may well and truly burst.