Cooper’s Wallaby recall overshadowed by McKenzie affair allegations

The state of Australian rugby at the moment was summed up at a recent press conference with head coach Ewen McKenzie, when the issue that would usually have dominated the agenda – Quade Cooper’s recall – wasn’t even mentioned until the 17th minute.

McKenzie faced an onslaught of questions on matters including Kurtley Beale’s mid-air argument with team manager Di Patston, the ‘offensive’ text messages and images Beale sent, the tribunal he faces next week as a result of the texts, and even the nature of McKenzie’s affair with Patston and whether it went beyond the professional.

He went on to be asked if he felt he had lost the confidence of the players after a poor Rugby Championship campaign and his handling of the Beale/Patston fiasco, and whether he was in fact informed of the text messages and photos in June, rather than last week, which is what he claims.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Patston’s work history and education qualifications showed great inconsistencies on her social media pages – which have since been deleted or amended – prompting questions about how she rose to a position of such power within the ARU. It is understood to be a matter of significant unrest amongst some members of the Wallabies squad.

Evidently, the most scandalous accusation is that McKenzie is engaged in an affair with Patston – one that he vehemently and frustratedly denied.

“I’ve got a professional relationship with her as I have with all the other people in my staff. Simple as that.”

When pressed, he added: “No. I’ve got a professional relationship with her. And I refute that there are people out there and some sort of campaign out there to impugn that’s the situation. I’ve got a professional relationship with her and I refute that.”

On the issue of whether her position was causing tensions within the camp, he said: “I don’t believe her appointment has caused angst. I think she came here as the business manager and she came here with a specific role to take the team to a new level. The whole idea of elite sports and elite teams is to actually get the best out of every part.

“I came here at short notice to try and improve things. My belief is to get the best out of a team you actually have to make progress on every front. She has extraordinary skills, she’s come in and made a massive difference in terms of the business side of it, and that was her role. That’s what she’s done.

“She worked at the Queensland government for 13 years in an auditing capacity and since that time she came and worked for the Reds and she did other things obviously prior to that. She has a very strong background, very strongly qualified in lots of areas around psychology and human behaviour. So she is more than qualified to do the job.”

He also denied the rumours that he had lost the dressing room: “I don’t think I have a divided camp. I know there’s been lots of talk in the newspapers and everyone’s got an opinion but I know the playing group.

“I choose the playing group. There’s a lot of guys there I’ve brought into the fold and given opportunity to and I’ve always talked about two things that are important — there’s talent and character and attitude. They’re both very important ingredients to me. I’ve been open and frank in my time so if there are issues obviously we’ll flesh them out. That’s something you’re doing every week, not unique to this week.”

Of course, the real story should have been about Quade Cooper’s return to the fold for next weekend’s Bledisloe Cup match. Since recovering from a shoulder injury suffered in May, he has been showing good form for Brisbane City in the NRC and guided them to a massive 77-26 win over North Harbour Rays yesterday.

Relieved to be back on rugby matter, McKenzie said: “Quade’s played a handful of games now and he played well on the weekend. We haven’t looked at him in our environment. (Starting) might be a stretch, I don’t know. I’ll form an opinion when I see him and see how he looks. He hasn’t been in the environment for the last nine months, 10 months.”