Ospreylia: How Welsh club looked Down Under

Ospreys will have an Australian twang this season, but it was not until May that they opted to recruit Down Under through necessity.

Mark Jones could pick a starting line-up that is 33% Aussie in the 2026-27 campaign, which gets under way with a United Rugby Championship (URC) fixture against Sharks in Durban on Saturday, 26 September (15:00 BST).

The Australian invasion started in the summer of 2025 when lock Ryan Smith arrived to soften the blow of losing Adam Beard to Montpellier.

He has been followed to west Wales by three Wallabies in back-row forward Liam Wright, centre Lalakai Foketi and wing Marika Koroibete, plus fly-half Lawson Creighton.

It is a recruitment drive that has excited supporters after the loss of Jac Morgan and Dewi Lake, but one that happened due to uncertainty over the club’s future.

“When we were looking in the market it was May, because that was really when we got the go-ahead from the Ospreys board to start recruitment,” admitted head coach Jones to the Scrum V podcast.

“You should be done at Christmas, you shouldn’t be looking in May, so some of it was necessity.”

The first piece of the jigsaw came with Wright, who had frequently cropped up on the Queensland Reds footage that Ospreys viewed when scouting Smith.

Jones said: “Who’s a guy that ticks a lot of boxes for what we need and happens to be very friendly with the lock we’d already signed?

“After that we thought that if we are going to bring three or four players in, we should probably get them from the same country for the cohesion bit.

“They all knew each other and we thought the best chance of them settling in and being happy was to recruit from the same sort of area.

“There were some other options from different parts of the world, but we felt the cohesion was something we could cash in on in terms of getting everybody up to speed quickly.”

Wright’s World Cup switch to Wales?

Ospreys will be “stoked” if the new quartet make an impact like Smith did in his first season.

Wales might also be watching with interest after the signing of former Wallabies captain Wright.

The 28-year-old has won six caps but, courtesy of his grandfather from Pembroke, will be eligible to play for Steve Tandy’s side next summer.

That opens up the possibility of Wright targeting a World Cup spot, but the forward is concentrating on Ospreys after injury torment since a shoulder blow suffered playing against Wales in 2024.

“I know that I want to get myself back playing good enough footie and consistent enough footie to push for international honours again,” he told Scrum V.

“I’ve always imagined that for Australia, I didn’t come over here because of the Welsh heritage and trying to flip.

“But given my journey, it would be irresponsible to try and think too far ahead. I want to play good footie for Ospreys and put a lot of minutes under my belt, making sure that I am loving footie again.”

Boss Jones on his new Aussies

Mark Jones on Liam Wright: “There is leadership – he has led Australia and been captain of the Reds. He has been incredible since coming through the door. With Liam, you are going to see composure, set-piece quality and a work rate that people will be proud of when they watch him.”

On Lalakai Foketi: “A very physical player, which is so important in the URC against South African and Irish teams. You have the gain line in the winter months but he gives a nice skill set around his passing and he’ll be able to use more of the width of the pitch. He is a very quiet and unassuming guy but very intellectual around the game.”

On Lawson Creighton: “There aren’t many outside halves that put defence down as their point of difference. He’s got a very long kicking game and can attack the line really well. He played 12 most of last year because [Waratahs coach] Mike Catt felt he had those attributes, but he has slotted back at 10 really well here.”

On Marika Koroibete: “Quite a bit has been made of Marika’s age but the first thing you look at are his physical metrics and what he is delivering. He is probably not the 10.7 secs 100m runner that he was but he has got eight or nine high-speed efforts and is very physical. He is different to what we’ve got and it’s about the blend. I spoke to Eddie Jones about him and Eddie was very complimentary, and that says it all.”

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