Talk is already begun towards who will represent Australia in rugby this year. Among the men and women selected, some will don the Australian green and gold in Test rugby or Sevens at the Olympic Games for the first time.
This prompted RUPERT GUINNESS to delve into the heart and soul of past and present players of what it means to wear the Australian jersey for the first time. He starts with former Wallaby and NSW fullback and current Sydney 10 News First sports presenter, MATT BURKE.
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Matt Burke has every right to look back on his Wallaby career with pride. How could he not with 81 Test caps, including selection in the 1999 World Cup and 2001 British and Irish Lions series winning sides.
But ask the former star full-back what achievement was really the most significant of his career. He will always cite the day he first played Test rugby and officially became Wallaby No. 710. It was on August 21, 1993 against South Africa in a 19-12 win at the Sydney Football Stadium. He was only 20 years old.
It was then that Burke’s identity as a Wallaby was forged. While he went on to become the most capped Wallabies full-back by the time he played his last Test – against the Springboks at Durban, in South Africa but in a 23-19 loss – Burke believes the honour of being a Wallaby should not be reflected by a player’s tally of Test caps; that the dye is cast once a player earns their first cap, not by how many they retire on.
“It's not really your jersey. It's a number you wear that represents Australia which you need to leave in a better place,” Burke says.
“It's a precious moment, but you don't know the longevity. Whether there's one cap, or a hundred … that you still represented your country is probably what we don't celebrate enough. It's difficult for those who have played one Test, or a handful of Tests. But I see that [first selection] as the point of no return. You are a number in history. There is an infinite amount of people who would love to be in that spot. So, you need to celebrate that jersey through and through.
“You're not only representing your country. You're representing your family, you're representing yourself first. You're representing your friends, then your club, your state, and your country.
“You then have a responsibility to everyone else. To the older players that have worn that jersey. There's no taking it for granted. Some people would give anything to have a crack at it, and never get that chance.”
However, Burke says that identity and responsibility is what anyone should feel in any team jersey, not just in a Test jersey. So, he encourages anyone who dons a jersey to behold the same conviction. “It is your jersey, your tribe, your group that you represent,” he says. “It doesn’t have to be a Test jersey. It can be your club, school … any team. You represent that team, the club and people who support it.”
The Call Up …
When Burke debuted for the Wallabies, he came off the bench in the No. 16 jersey. It was in the third of three Tests against the Springboks who were then led by their then new captain and No. 6 Francois Pienaar, who two years later would accept the Webb Ellis Cup from Nelson Mandela after leading South Africa to World Cup victory.
When they toured Australia in 1993, there was still a mystique about the Springboks who had only returned to international rugby in 1992 with the end of apartheid law in South Africa finally well under way and heading towards its welcomed official ending in 1994. It was also their first tour to Australia since 1971 when they were confronted with anti-apartheid protests.
Not forgotten by Burke though was how the Springboks, “physically intimidated everyone” on the field. Burke’s first taste of that came prior to the first Test in Sydney that he was not selected for and was won by South Africa 19-12. Playing in NSW’s 24-23 win against the Springboks at Sydney’s Concord Oval, Burke recalls how after he took a high ball, “They basically took my legs out and I landed on my neck.”
Burke’s initial call-up to the Wallabies squad came for the second Test in Brisbane on August 14. While selected as a reserve in the No. 17 jersey, he did not play in Australia’s 28-20 victory and says he had to return his Wallabies jersey to the team manager.
In those days, getting game time was difficult for the reserves who were not used by coaches as ‘finishers’ to up the ante in speed and strength for the last twenty minutes of a game as they are now. “You only replaced on an injury,” says Burke. “Basically, if you were in the first XV, you played for 80 minutes.” Burke still prepared for that Test as a starter. Due to his versatility in a team laden with 1991 World Cup winners, he had to cover as wing, fullback and outside centre. That meant learning the playbook with every permutation in mind for three positions.
The Moment …
In the Sydney Test a week later, Burke did play. The moment came when Damian Smith left the field injured. Suddenly, the experience of the week leading up to that moment became so special; especially receiving and trying on his Wallabies kit.
“I remember … cutting the sleeves off and trying it on the night before in the mirror thinking, ‘Wow, this could well be [the time],’” says Burke of a time when jerseys were given by the team manager and only after a player was told to collect it from his room.
“It was laid out … folded. It was ready to go, for you to pick up in a nice little pile. You took it back to your room and … absolutely, I tried it on. I made sure ... Do I need to button up? Was the collar up? Do I tuck it in?
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The Game …
As for the Test? Burke says: “I still have the photo at home, the program and photo of me. I've got this steely look, but I was absolutely shitting myself.” He even wore a black mouth guard to mask his nerves. He admits he was motivated by the Russian boxer Ivan Drago in the film Rocky IV who “wore a black mouth guard” and looked “scary as ... I thought, ‘I better try something like that to try and intimidate.’
Singing the national anthem before a packed 41,877 home crowd in Sydney added to the occasion, especially knowing that his parents were seated in the grandstand before him and the Wallabies. But Burke would never put his hand on chest and clutch the Australian coat of arms during the anthem.
“We embraced arm over arm, standing together,” he says. Later, Burke stopped singing the last line so he could soak up the full force of the Australian crowd singing it. “I hung off that last ‘Advance Australia Fair’ ...,” he recalls. “I thought. ‘If I can hear the crowd, I've got support. You realise, looking around, that your family is there, your friends are there; it is especially obviously when you're playing at home.”
So pumped was Burke to play, the experience seemingly flew by. He barely felt any fatigue afterwards. “I was running on so much adrenaline,” says Burke, who was not even dissuaded when winded in his first tackle of the game, on Springbok hooker Uli Schmidt.
“He landed on me. I could not breathe for the life of me. I remember going, ‘Get up … You've got to get up, mate. You can't be laying down.’ So, I got up and it was mostly shallow of breaths.” The game then unraveled into a “whirlwind” experience that ended with a magnificent Wallabies win.
For Matt Burke, it marked his proud arrival as Wallaby No. 710.
