How Tom Wright responded when asked about Wallabies’ Bledisloe Cup drought

Fullback Tom Wright has spoken about how the Wallabies themselves would be either “naïve” or “lying” to say they don’t think about the team’s long-lasting Bledisloe Cup drought, but it’s certainly not a focus ahead of this weekend’s clash in Sydney.

New Zealand have dominated their rugby rivalry with Australia for more than two decades, with the All Blacks taking hold of the Bledisloe Cup in 2003 and not looking back. Richie McCaw, Kieran Read and Sam Cane are among the captains who have lifted the giant trophy.

With a new two-Test series set to get underway from Saturday afternoon at Accor Stadium, current captain Scott Barrett will want to become the latest New Zealand captain to have that honour. The All Blacks only have to win one of the two Tests to make that happen.

But the Wallabies will have a thing or two to say about that, but they’ll let their actions on the field do the talking. Australia have won both of their two Tests in Sydney so far this year, while the New Zealanders have struggled in Wellington – the site for the second Test.

“Probably not highlighting it so much as much as it gets spoken about externally but the awareness speaks around it being obviously a while,” Wright told reporters on Monday.

“It’s definitely there from a player’s perspective. I’d be naïve or I’d be lying to say we don’t think about it.

“We don’t play any harder because it’s been longer, we’re always there. The group’s working extremely hard… one-and-a-half (games) just isn’t good enough, unfortunately.”

The Wallabies instead seem a lot more focused on producing a performance that they can be proud of. They’re coming off an educational two-Test series away in Argentina, with the visitors winning the first Test 20-19 and looking solid for the opening 40 in the second match.

Australia led 20-3 at one stage but 80 minutes is a long time at the international level. Argentina fought their way back with a barrage of tries and ended up running away with a staggering 67-27 win, and that saw unfortunate records tumble for the men in gold.

That was the most points the Wallabies have ever conceded in a Test match – surpassing the 61 scored by the Springboks in 1997 – and it was also the first time they’ve had 50 points put on them in a single half of rugby.

With stats like that, it can be easy to dwell on the negatives.

But this is a team that’s building. They beat Wales twice earlier this year and actually played some good rugby over in Argentina, which included a promising first-half performance in Santa Fe before the team lost their way.

“It was definitely some of the best football we’ve played,” Wright said.

“We’ve played in two monsoons prior to that so that was probably a fair contrast. The boys were pretty excited by the conditions – it was seriously warm over there too.

“Part of the cohesion that’s coming about, obviously there were a couple of changes in the team but part of the game style that Joe and the coaches have created for us is that anyone can come into the team and thrive in that environment.

“I think we saw that in patches for sure.”