Australia U20s coach Chris Whitaker is hoping a physical preparation alongside Georgia’s U20s side will battle-harden the team ahead of the World U20 Championships.
Whitaker and the Aussies will open their campaign against South Africa (Sunday 11:30 pm AEST) in Calvisano.
Watch every match of the U20s World Championships live and on-demand via Stan Sport.
It kick-starts a brutal campaign for the Australians, drawn alongside defending champions England and Scotland.
The physical nature of their opposition led Whitaker to enlist the help of the Georgians in the quest for the necessary edge to propel them into the semi-finals.
“We spoke to Georgia a while ago. Lado [Kilasonia] their coach has been coaching for a while and we had good contacts there.
“They’re a big physical pack, so we did a good unit session and a 30-minute block where we did scrums and lineouts, and it was always the way we planned it.
“We’ve got three physical teams and it was good to come up against Georgia who are another physical team.”
The Aussies are also dealing with the heat in Italy, with temperatures reaching close to 35 degrees in the north of Italy.
Whitaker believes the sweltering conditions will come into their favour as they look to play expansive Rugby.
“We're using these advantages. We're not going to change the way we play because we're playing some big teams,” he said.
“We're hoping that the big guys will struggle in the heat and we'll be able to continue to play our footy.
“It's going to be an interesting thing at the end of the day.”
Whitaker has largely kept the faith with the squad that went through the Rugby Championship U20s undefeated, working Aden Ekanayake back into the squad via the bench.
It allows the coach to select a 6-2 split on the bench, with scrumhalf James Martens also able to cover the back three.
“I don't even know if he's played a game of 15s yet. So, I think bringing him back through the bench is probably the right thing to do,” he added.
“The beauty about him is he's so comfortable in the wide channels that he'll cover, if we have any problems out wide, he'll cover that kind of space as well…We've got quite a bit of versatility in terms of where guys can play.”
