Suaalii to return as Wallabies embrace painful lessons of Santa Fe drubbing

Star winger Max Jorgensen said the painful lessons of a record drubbing in Santa Fe in 2024 are driving the Wallabies to another win in Argentina on Sunday – and they’ll have Len Ikitau and Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii back on deck to help the cause, too.

Ikitau and Suaalii are set to re-unite in the Wallabies’ midfield for the first time in over a month, after the duo’s last started together in Australia’s 57-10 win over Italy in Perth.

Ikitau subsequently underwent an ankle operation and missed the first three Tests under Les Kiss, and after sitting out the second Test win over Japan with a hamstring injury, Suaalii was named on the bench for last week’s win over the Pumas.

Hunter Paisami and Isaac Henry performed well in the midfield for the last two Tests , but Kiss is set to re-install Ikitau and Suaalii for the Mendoza clash, in which the Wallabies will be chasing rare back-to-back wins over the Pumas in the same year.

Ikitau and Suaalii were first paired together in the latter’s debut at Twickenham in late 2024, and were a mainstay under Joe Schmidt. In 25 Tests since Suaalii’s debut, the duo have been the starting centres on 16 occasions, including against the Lions and the win in Johannesburg.

Ikitau won the John Eales medallist last year and Suaalii was nominated for World Rugby’s breakthrough player of the year in 2025.

Debate has continued to rage about where Suaalii is best deployed, however, and that was heightened when Paisami and Henry both took their opportunities well in Kiss’ early games. But Suaalii also responded by providing strong impact from the bench last week.

Kiss has kept several fresh players up his sleeve for the Mendoza clash, knowing the grim recent history of the Wallabies in their second games in Argentina.

Since the Rugby Championship changed to biennial mini-tours in 2022, where teams tour and play consecutive games in one country, the Wallabies have won the first game and been thumped in the second . In 2022, they were beaten 48-17 by the Michael Cheika-coached Pumas , and in 2024, a win in La Plata was followed by 67-27 drubbing , the highest ever score conceded by the Wallabies.

The Wallabies were leading 20-3 after 30 minutes but then fell apart in the Santa Fe heat, conceding 64-7 in the next 50 minutes.

“A big motivation is looking back at two ... years ago when we were over here last time. We had a close win in the first game. It was good to get that and then sort of went to Santa Fe the week after and put in a pretty poor game, and lost by a fair bit, as everyone knows,” Jorgensen said.

“It’s looking back at that and seeing how we cannot let that happen again.”

Jorgensen made his run-on debut that day, and was one of several players battling illness. The rookie was so crook he even hospitalised after the game and missed Tests in subsequent weeks.

Jorgensen said the lesson was you can never rest on your laurels when playing the Pumas.