Why Matt Philip is upwardly mobile in the second row A Set the default text size A Set large text size
Replay A Set the default text size A Set large text size
One of the unexpected success stories of the Australian season has been Melbourne second-rower Matt Philip.
At the beginning of the year, he may have been forgiven for suspecting that international rugby was about to pass him by in 2020. The World Cup starting pair of Rory Arnold and Izack Rodda were rightly established as first choices, Lukhan Salakaia-Loto was firmly in the mix, and a promising crop of recent Wallaby under 20s – Harry Hockings at the Reds, Nick Frost at the Brumbies, and Trevor Hosea in Melbourne – was pushing up from the fertile ground underneath them. It looked like Philip could be squeezed out.