Former Wallabies continue to weigh in on hiring of Kiwi coach Joe Schmidt

Rugby Australia confirmed last week that Schmidt, who is a former Ireland head coach and All Blacks assistant coach, signed a two-year deal starting in March, committing to the Wallabies until the end of the British and Irish Lions tour in 2025.

Hooper, who is now part of Australia's Sevens programme in a bid to represent his country at the Olympic Games in France later this year, believes Schmidt˜s appointment is the correct one for the Wallabies, especially after they experienced the sometimes ludicrous antics of Eddie Jones during 2024.

"That was a crazy year," the former openside flanker told Nine's Wide World of Sports.

"The game needs a really clear vision and somebody to be able to pull that together, pull the pieces of the puzzle together. There's many ways to skin a cat."

Hooper also urged Wallabies supporters to look past Schmidt's nationality saying the fact that he is a New Zealander is irrelevant.

"Players want to win, players want to be coached well, be respected, and play a game of rugby that's exciting. It would have been great to have more Australians in contention for the job," he said.

"I love Australian rugby so it'd be great if you had 10 candidates who were really strong to put up their name for the job.

"That's hopefully something that Joe can bring to the environment - getting more Australian coaches ready to take on that type of a job."

Schmidt turned Ireland into a genuine force at Test level and guided them to the top of World Rugby's official rankings before resigning from his position after the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan.

"I think there's some great pedigree with what he's done in the last 10-15 years," said Hooper.

"So really positive."

Hooper said teams which Schmidt coached had clear characteristics which were very difficult to counter.

"Their ability to hold ball, their game plan of applying pressure on the other team, playing in the right areas of the field," he added.

"Being able to maintain possession, get through phases, have really good structure, they're playing at the right end of the field and they obviously had some strong game controllers throughout that time as well.

"And hearing about his player management, to allow players to be playing their best rugby was also something that I had heard, through the grapevine as well. Those are all good things."

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