The buck, no doubt, stops with ABs coach Steve Hansen and his Wallabies counterpart, Ewen McKenzie, who have chewed and spat out their protagonists on the park.
Hansen has rightly plumped for Ben Smith to start at fullback, a day after McKenzie named Folau at No 15.
Hawke's Bay Magpie Dagg has missed out all together in his equation so Cory Jane will be on the right wing because, it seems, the selectors (Hansen, Ian Foster and Grant Fox) were not going to tinker with specialist Julian Savea on the left wing pending a howler on game night.
Jane hasn't had a memorable Super season so mediocrity from him, Savea or Smith will see Dagg back in the fray.
McKenzie has benched Bernard Foley and Tevita Kuridrani and injected Nic White, Matt Toomua and Ashley-Cooper, as his halves and centres.
Throwing Pat McCabe and Rob Horne on the wings looks iffy but that simply means he's resisted getting sucked into the hype of pitting Folau against Savea to whet the appetite of the stock-car brigade.
McKenzie has not only started Beale but is playing him out of position as the joker in his pack while Ashley-Cooper slots into his preferred role.
Not bad for a former Wallaby prop disparagingly nicknamed "Link" in the vein of the missing link.
You see, that's why this opening encounter isn't so much about the players' credentials, as such, but clearly the adroitness of coaches/selectors.
Ask Hansen and McKenzie and they will opt for a dismissive stance but the funny-shaped ball is entirely in their court and they will be yanking the strings on their puppets.
How the sketches will take shape on the whiteboard will not only be pivotal to the outcome of the Transtasman clash but also become the template for the twin Four Nations and Bledisloe Cup series.
Realistically disgruntled fans won't be able to bitch at players, especially if they are having to adapt outside their comfort zones.
Talk of whether winning the Super Rugby crown is pertinent to how the series pans out has merit on both sides.
Yes, the Super Rugby isn't a yardstick of success in the test arena because the intensity will be different.
Analysis based on historical results is simply propaganda.
Conversely, Super Rugby bragging rights has to be a fillip, not to mention Hansen conceding "if we get beaten and we do that, that's life".
You must be doing something right if you're beating a franchise boasting ABs, albeit some outgoing ones or those who are a tad wet around the ears.
The onus is on the coaches/selectors from all the countries - including the Springboks - to put aside their provincial/state prejudices to find a winning formula.
Their chosen ones have to be the epitome of impartiality, something that hasn't been so transparent on either side of the Tasman.
The expectation of AB fans will be magnified as the men in black sit on the cusp of a historic 18th test victory on the trot although winning the series can become a timely balm.
For McKenzie the headache had already kicked in with the Tahs' ascendancy but it need not have been counterproductive.
That he released his team as early as Tuesday suggests he's on the front foot.
When Fiji-born winger Henry Speight recovers from injury, what then?
It's imperative the Wallabies win first up to inject much-needed spice in elite international rugger because if they can't do it on their home turf then McKenzie will know how Robbie Deans felt when he displaced the Kiwi on the portfolio of a title-winning Brumbies coach.
It's perhaps too early for bloodletting but Tahs coach Michael Cheika must now be the logical successor if McKenzie fails to deliver.
Cheika's Waratahs were by no means sublime - they coped in the scrums and their lineouts were dysfunctional.
What the multi-million-dollar fashion businessman did do amiably was instil a fabric of belief in his men to achieve in the face of all the hype.
Cheika had Beale doing things in the backline that Deans was reluctant to do and McKenzie almost seems compelled to do in shrugging off a Tory demeanour.
Can Cheika do the same with Quade Cooper?
An erratic Cooper must be in the "excitement pool" but he'll have to earn the right to return.
Folau at fullback and Beale as pivot promise electric footy.
I say boot to touch any thoughts of backline conservatism.
Commendably Hansen has reciprocated with runners because nothing puts fans off more than win-at-all-cost footy that deteriorates to 80 minutes of mindless ping pong.
Rugby has to be the winner.
