{"id":15008,"date":"2012-09-27T17:00:20","date_gmt":"2012-09-27T15:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/09\/update-1-rugby-cooper-wont-play-for-wallabies-without-improvements\/"},"modified":"2012-09-27T17:00:20","modified_gmt":"2012-09-27T15:00:20","slug":"update-1-rugby-cooper-wont-play-for-wallabies-without-improvements","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/update-1-rugby-cooper-wont-play-for-wallabies-without-improvements\/","title":{"rendered":"UPDATE 1-Rugby-Cooper won’t play for Wallabies without improvements"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

(Recasts with Cooper quotes)<\/span><\/p>\n

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By Nick Mulvenney<\/p>\n

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SYDNEY, Sept 27<\/span> (Reuters) – Wallabies flyhalf Quade Cooper said he would not play for Australia unless changes were made to the “toxic” environment surrounding the team, which he felt was “destroying” him as a “player and as a person”.<\/p>\n

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The 24-year-old has been sidelined for Australia’s last two Rugby Championship tests in South Africa and Argentina because of a knee problem but sparked huge controversy with tweets and comments made over the weekend.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Offered the chance to clarify his position on Thursday in an interview with Fox Sports, with whom he has a contract, Cooper said he would not play for Australia or sign a new deal with the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) unless improvements were made.<\/p>\n

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“I’m just trying to be the best that I can be and that’s why I don’t want to be involved in that environment,” he said.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

“For me to improve as a player and as a person, you want to be in the best possible environment. I feel that environment is destroying me as a person and as a player so I can’t do my best to represent myself, my country and my friends to the best of my ability.”<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Cooper attacked the lack of a dedicated training facility for the Wallabies and reiterated his criticism of the defensive gameplans of coach Robbie Deans.<\/p>\n

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“If you are going to pick an attacking player, especially at 10, you sort of want to work on playing attacking rugby,” he added.
\n\u00a0 Continued…<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Recasts with Cooper quotes) By Nick Mulvenney SYDNEY, Sept 27 (Reuters) – Wallabies flyhalf Quade Cooper said he would not play for Australia unless changes were made to the “toxic” environment surrounding the team, which he felt was “destroying” him as a “player and as a person”. The 24-year-old has been sidelined for Australia’s last […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-15008","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15008\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}