The Waratahs suffered an early blow to their Super Rugby preperations when lock Kane Douglas rolled his ankle whilst at a Wallabies training camp.
The incident occured during a game of touch rugby against British Backpackers on Tuesday as part of a promotion for the upcoming British and Irish Lions tour to Australia.
Waratahs coach Michael Cheika said the injury will keep his star second-rower off the training field for at least a fortnight, robbing Douglas of valuable pre-season training.
The Australian Rugby Union (ARU) was already facing a backlash from the Waratahs over plans to quarantine Wallaby players three weeks before the British and Irish Lions Test series, which could see the Sydney-based side stripped of more than half their starting team.
Cheika was surprised to see Douglas suffer his injury after the Waratahs boss was guaranteed by the ARU there wouldn't be any physical activity.
"We were assured there would be no rugby content whatsoever and we've had a player injured shooting an advertisement without the correct strapping," Cheika told AAP.
"He's now going to start the season with just two weeks of training - that type of stuff makes it (releasing players) hard to swallow.
"I understand mistakes can happen sometime but we can minimise them and that shouldn't be happening.
"That makes it very difficult to believe in the process when the details aren't being maintained correctly."
Comments
spoons says...
Even tough rugby is toom much for the soft Tah's players.
Posted 23:11 17th January 2013