Mortlock pays tribute to absent Umaga

Stirling Mortlock

BRISBANE - It's not often you'll hear a rugby player bemoaning the absence of Tana Umaga, until you hear Stirling Mortlock talk.

The Wallabies' centre and goalkicker squares off against Mils Muliaina in the Tri-Nations/Bledisloe Cup test here tomorrow, one of a number to climb the All Blacks No 13 merry-go-round this year.

After Umaga played his final test at Murrayfield in November, the search began for a replacement and it got tricky when Conrad Smith broke his leg playing Super 14.

Muliaina, seemingly the No 1 choice, will play his third consecutive test at 13 tomorrow after brief cameos from Isaia Toeava and Casey Laulala.

Mortlock, 29, plays his 47th test tomorrow and, with all due respect to the gifted Muliaina, admits it isn't quite the same without Umaga there.

"I think anyone's better than marking Tana, but I enjoyed it because you enjoy playing against the best," Mortlock said.

"He was an outstanding competitor on and off the field, more often than not you'd have a bit of a laugh then off you'd go back to your position."

So are the All Blacks less of a force without their inspirational leader?

"From a leadership perspective he brought a whole new resolve to that All Blacks team, he really gelled them extremely well.

"So far the leadership of Richie (McCaw) has done the same, but obviously Tana was the benchmark for centres around the world. All facets of his game were outstanding, his ability to contest the breakdown, his ability to mix it up on attack, he had all bases covered."

Mortlock, at 1.91m and 102kg one of four 100kg-plus giants in the Wallabies' dangerous backline, said they were working on being more "clinical' on attack.

It didn't get much better than their 49-0 hiding of South Africa here a fortnight ago when second five-eighth Matt Giteau scored two tries.

"We've been working on a lot of new structures for our attack and we've certainly felt over the last few weeks on the training paddock we've made improvements.

"Our forward pack made huge inroads against the Springboks and that was a big confidence booster for the team that we can improve on.

"We love playing New Zealand, it's always a benchmark. When you're playing against the All Blacks, it's as good as it gets."

And if things go remarkably to plan, Mortlock could hit 300 test points tomorrow.

But it would take a Carter-esque performance, as he sits on 280 including 62 from five tests in 2006.

- NZPA