Mortlock: The More Things Change...

As Australia and France get ready for the second match of their two-match test series, Armchair Playmaker thinks back on how familiar one moment from last week's match looked.

It's been almost five years since Wallaby center Stirling Mortlock broke Kiwi hearts with his intercept try in the 2003 Rugby World Cup semifinal match, but he pulled off an eerily similar maneuver last weekend. The takeaways were at different points on the pitch and from different sorts of passes (one was from a long cut-out pass from flyhalf and one was from a ball going back inside in the midfield), but Archair Playmaker sees common threads nonetheless. See below to compare:

Here he is in the 2003 World Cup:



And here he is in the France match last week (at about 3:45 in the video clip):



Same old Mortlock?