Munster’s nearly-man Latham in line for call-up against Ireland

MUNSTER’S “nearly man” Chris Latham put himself in line for a place in Australia’s starting line-up against Ireland in Melbourne on Saturday by scoring a record five tries in the 142-0 demolition of hapless Namibia at the Adelaide Oval.

Latham, who scorned Munster approaches last summer having more or less committed himself to coach Alan Gaffney, claimed before Saturday’s match that he needed to turn in “a phenomenal performance” against Namibia to have any chance of playing against Ireland.

Whether five tries, even against such palpably weak opposition, will do the trick is up to Aussie coach Eddie Jones who announces his team on Wednesday.

The Aussies were absolutely ruthless in running in 22 tries against a side that would - and I’m being serious - struggle to win the Munster Development League.

Latham broke a try scoring record he once shared with the legendary David Campese who, along with Jason Little and Greg Cornelson, had previously bagged four tries in a Test match.

He had bagged four against Ireland on his debut five years ago and reached that mark as early as the 38th minute on Saturday before getting to the elusive five on 74 minutes.

Latham’s over reaction to his achievement reflected the attitude of the Australian camp and the Adelaide crowd of more than 33, 000. The players accorded themselves a lap of honour and were accorded a standing ovation by fans who by nature know little or nothing about rugby union - the game is hardly played in Adelaide at all.

Yesterday’s Sunday Mail front page headline, “TRY-MENDOUS”, was followed by their match report headlined “CLASS OF THEIR OWN”.

It may have been the biggest ever World Cup winning margin (beating the 145-17 by which New Zealand humiliated Japan in 1995) but, if anything, they might have been embarrassed by the ruthless manner in which they kept going right to the end.

And the poor Namibians weren’t helped by French referee Joel Jutge who was heartless enough to award the Australians a penalty try on extremely dubious grounds.

Latham later observed: “I was sniffing hard for that fifth try. It’s a pleasing record to have.”

He wouldn’t be drawn any further about his public disagreement with Jones at his omission from the regular starting line-up while the coach himself simply said: “Of course you’re going to have disapponted players.

"But there’s a big difference between disappointment and disharmony. You don’t play like that if you have disharmony.”

The man feeling the heat as a result of Latham’s try bonanza is Matt Rogers.

Even though he scored a couple of tries himself and landed 16 of the 22 conversions to set an Australian scoring record of 42 (three more than Matt Burke accumulated against Canada in 1996), Rogers, who played this time on the left wing, dropped the only high kick that came his way - and that was about the only flaw in the Australian performance.