Top Tips from Melbourne Rebels and Australian star utility back, James O’Connor. I first came across James O’Connor on our last England tour to Australia; I was watching the first of our midweek games against an Australia Barbarians side on a Tuesday night before the first test. The game was a pretty standard affair, with the well prepared England side winning the set piece battle, when this Justin Bieber look a like character (sorry couldn’t resist) cut the English defense apart, not only with speed, but for his size great power. He was beating people with footwork, and shrugging off tacklers for fun. It turned out to be James O'Connor, he scored 3 tries in 43mins that game and was the stand out performer by a long way. I was shocked to find he was so young, and had already made his full Australian debut as their second youngest player. He came off at half time during that Barbarians game, and would later feature in the full test team that weekend. Since that moment he hasn’t real...
