Australian captain Mortlock out of Bledisloe Cup
Stirling Mortlock, the Australian centre and captain, has been ruled out of Saturday night's Bledisloe Cup rugby Test at ANZ Stadium in Sydney against the All Blacks due to concussion. It will be a big blow for coach Robbie Deans, who was hoping to fell his former team.
The 31-year-old Mortlock was officially ruled out on Monday night after failing to recover sufficiently from a heavy head knock suffered in the first half of the Wallabies' 16-9 win over South Africa in Perth last Saturday.
As a result flanker George Smith will captain Australia while Western Force's Ryan Cross is expected to replace Mortlock.
Deans said: "Stirling was concussed last weekend. We had hoped that, with time, the symptoms would resolve themselves, but that hasn't happened soon enough for this match, so we've made the call early.
"George took over once Stirling left the field in Perth and got the team over the finish line so we've opted to maintain continuity by leaving him in charge."
1 Comments
Add a comment
Posted by ulinda – 22 Jul 2008, 2:08 PM
Sorry to see Mortlock out of the game on Saturday but I am glad to see the team putting his well-being center stage. Hurry back, Stirling.