Former Brumbies and Springbok coach Jake White mused at a Bulls press conference he plans for around 2.5 injuries per match. If accurate, and White often is, five Aussies not much talked up for a match day 23 first up against the Lions may be big in the third Test. Who might they be?

Outgoing Wallaby coach Joe Schmidt is a pick-and-stick man. He also believes he is the best teacher of rugby in Australia at present: thus, not shy to stick with a benched club player (see increasingly unused Tane Edmed at the somewhat confused Waratahs, who are the very worst at gainline success this year, yet keep running picking a pedestrian ten to exploit turnovers) if he sees the man fitting into his plan.

Nevertheless, Schmidt has tended to see form in Super Rugby Pacific as his preferred benchmark. Thus, a look across the competition so far is in order.

The 12 biggest-minutemen have familiar names (Tom Wright and Carlo Tizzano at 480 minutes, big men Nick Frost, Rob Leota, and Darcy Swain just behind, and stalwart Len Ikitau at 471 minutes). Long-legged Ben Donaldson rounds out the Wallaby “probables” in the top dozen in playing time this year.

Yet Wallaby fringe players loom:

560 minutes for Brumbye Andy Muirhead (9 try involvements).

550 for Western Force’s Harry Potter, who is still just 27.

549 for speedster Corey Toole, who could get a look with Max Jorgensen’s ankle tweaked and no recovery timeline sure.

540 for young Mac Grealy, a promising back three player whose 60 carries have got his team over the gainline three of four times.

These four players have generated plenty of video for Schmidt’s team to study, but it is the magically named former Leicester Tiger (where he scored 20 tries) who may be called up, as he was last November. Potter is versatile, handsome enough to face Huw Jones without shame, and is the type of footballer Schmidt likes on a bench.

Muirhead gets more out of his body and skillset than just about anyone, but the thought of him defending a James Lowe or Duhan van der Merwe took a hit as he sat forlorn, cross-legged and man bun awry, watching Leota stroll in for a try. Test selection begins with utter stopping power, one on one, as unfair as it may seem.

Toole has the same disclaimer: he finds space both on attack and in defence, where space is not good.

Harry Potter. Photo: Julius Dimataga, Wallabies

With Potter in our pockets, we look at the high carry crowd. No surprise to see Wallaby captain Harry Wilson with 69 carries, but a bit odd to see him as the fifth highest carry Aussie. He has led all of Super Rugby Pacific on more than one occasion; perhaps this shift is allowing him to link more, tackle even better (101 completed at a 91% success rate), and hit 63 attacking rucks at speed. His carries have also broken tackles: he wins the gaineline 65% of the time he carries into contact.

Wright has taken the ball up from the back fence 72 times this season, making it over the gainline 71% of the time. Angus Bell starts at very different places than the Brumbies fullback, but his 70 carries into the teeth of the biggest defenders has been 54% gainline-successful. Allan Alaalatoa is being tackled back more: 38% gainline on his 60 carries.

Tearaway Tizzano has been better (60% on 58 carries) as has lock Frost (48% on 59 carries); both have hit over 120 attacking rucks and been their teams’ high forward tacklers. Tizzano has made it to 50 defensive rucks as well; but has not shown the nous Schmidt will want against the Lions who may carry four or five opensiders (Tom Curry, Josh van der Flier, Jac Morgan, Jack Willis and/or Rory Darge).

So who are the up-and-coming heavy carry men? Tom Hooper leads all Aussies with 75 carries but he is woeful at gainline (38%, the same as prop Alaalatoa), a trait he had in 2023. He still needs to learn a shape in contact which cuts down on the forces chopping him, and find acceleration into the tackle. The things which may attract Schmidt to Hooper are his breakdown work (5 steals; but struggles to clean legally and forcefully) and lineout size.

Tom Hooper. (Photo by Paul Kane/Getty Images)

Langi Gleeson has been far more impressive in the carry: he is 64% gainline over 74 runs with ball in hand, most of which have ended in heavy tackles as he takes on the duty of primary (often only) big baller. Surely he is the kind of robust presence for a Lions battle, but he was already in the mix for the first 23.

Tackle monsters may be a more fruitful field to harvest from:

Nick Champion de Crespigny looks the part of bouncer-bully more than Hooper, and his 111 tackles have generated more heat (and he does not miss many). Schmidt has said to many he prefers a big mean athlete at six: “I can teach him the rugby part.” It feels very much like this tutoring is about to happen, albeit for a brief time indeed.

Bad boy Swain keeps cropping up if we look at carry, ruck, tackle, and involvement. But is he worth the risk, given he still misses too many first up tackles and is a card magnet? Luke Reimer seems to have hit a trough of form, but his 11 breakdown steals at 78 defensive rucks makes one wonder: will more than Fraser McReight and Tizzano be needed as a jackal flanker?

I suggest that along with de Crespigny, Reimer, and Potter, we may see a gamer like Charlie Gamble, a pugnacious player in the mold of the Curry brothers (we can imagine the three of them getting curry and rice at Gamble’s best pick in the wee hours after whatever happens in the final Test). Gamble has has to put the Tahs on his back a few times; carrying ferociously, hitting 46 defensive rucks for four steals and a heap of slowed ball using the darkest of arts), and trailing only Tizzano in tackle success.

So who is our fifth player to stock the tail end of the squad, and run on to the pitch from the bench, when the chips are on the table?

Charlie Gamble of the Waratahs is tackled. (Photo by Brett Hemmings/Getty Images)

No, I will stick with Edmed as the joker, the semi-bolter, the “as I said” repeater by Schmidt, who kept choosing CJ Stander when all in Ireland protested, and kept faith in him, undersized, not beloved at club at first, and ready to play at all times.

They may find themselves up against Lions youngsters like Fin Smith, Tommy Freeman, and Henry Pollock from England; big Joe McCarthy of Ireland, and perhaps a bolter like Tom Jordan, too.

Who do you reckon is at the end of the bench behind the bench?