WALLABIES STAR ISRAEL Folau broke the all-time record for Super Rugby tries with his 60th touchdown for the NSW Waratahs against the Blues in Auckland on Saturday.
The prolific fullback surpassed Doug Howlett’s 59 during his stints at the Highlanders, Hurricanes, and Blues between 1997-2007, with the New Zealander needing 104 games to reach his target.
In contrast, Folau set the new mark in his 96th match and will likely run away with the record, having recently signed a new four-year deal with his club until the end of 2022, putting to bed any concerns that he may move overseas.
The record-breaking try came from a Bernard Foley cross-kick which Folau plucked out of the air to score, although it was not enough to save the Waratahs with the Blues taking the game 32-29.
Folau called it “a huge honour and a privilege” to head a list that also includes Caleb Ralph (58 tries) Joe Roff (57), Christian Cullen, Bryan Habana and Stirling Mortlock (all 56).
“There’s some great names on the list. But it’s a team effort and without the team those things wouldn’t be possible,” he said.
Many of Folau’s tries were set up by fellow Wallaby and Waratah Foley, who said he knew Folau was something special when he saw him at his first training session.
“He did something freakish down the edge, he caught a ball around his toes and flicked it back inside, and this was a guy who hadn’t played with a rugby ball for three years,” he told the Rugby Australia website recently.
“I just remember thinking what a freak he was, or he is, from day dot.
He can score tries other blokes can’t, just by the way he beat defenders or attract defenders but still have the power to score a try,” he added.
Since making his Super Rugby debut in 2013, Folau has scored at least one try against every one of the 17 different teams that he has faced.
His seven against the Queensland Reds is his biggest tally against a single opponent.
The divisive 30-year-old, who switched to union from rugby league in 2013, currently has the fourth most tries in Australian Test history.
His rugby union future seemed in doubt after the devout Christian wrote on social media last year that God’s plan for gay people was hell unless they repented.
The comments sparked an uproar and led to him being called in by Rugby Australia officials, prompting speculation he might return to rugby league or move overseas.
But rugby chiefs ultimately decided against any disciplinary action and Folau has continued in the Test side and to score tries for the Waratahs.
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Delighted for Izzy.
A great player and a real family man. Now a record breaker and the snowflakes can’t take that away from him.
@Treaty Bhoy: fair play. If you call people snowflakes you win any argument. Good to see other people are in on that trick.
A good family man unless of course someone in his family was gay. Then I’d say he probably wouldn’t be.
@Treaty Bhoy: Yea fair play. Gay people go to hell to burn in the eternal flames of damnation and suffer the wrath of god. Sound.
@Treaty Bhoy: and here he is on queue… One of The42′s most well liked posters.
@Brendan Heery: Funny that no matter how often he changes his name you can always tell it’s him
@Treaty Bhoy: why do you do it?. Still no answer.
Fantastic player, surpassing the great deadly Doug a great achievement, the thing with opinions is everyone is entitled to one, man can believe what he wants,
@Richy Fitz: he can believe what he wants but the moment he decides to tell his 200 thousand odd twitter and Instagram followers that all gays are going to hell kind of changes my perception of him. People are free to believe anything but they aren’t necessarily free to discriminate against a particular section of society. Go back and sub out the word gay in his tweets for any word you like that applied to you – Irish, black, jew, white, Muslim, Korean, whatever and see how you feel about it then.
He might have passed howletts scoring record, but he isn’t in the same league as a person because howlett is a gent, while falou an ignorant bigoted homophobic dope.
@Bungee Aky: maybe, but he’s quite right though
@Bungee Aky: Ah Doug Howlett. “He drinks in bars and he jumps on cars” that Gent?
@De Zach Same: where else do you expect him to drink? Would you rather him jumping on a gay or a Datsun?
Kinda surprised the record was only 59 to be honest when you think of all the great wingers – rockocoko, sivivatu, savea and the above mentioned Cullen, howlett, habana etc
@RhinoDino: Previously they played a max 13 games a season up to 2006 then you had the real movement of players after 4/5 seasons to Europe!
Fair play to him though expansion and so on has made it easier to break the old records. Great player none the less
@Eddie Hekenui: super player. 60 tries is no joke. The names on the top try scorer list brought back some good memories when I saw it.
Folau, Howlett, Ralph, Roff, Cullen, Mortlock, Habana, Nonu, Perenara
@Jim Demps: Yeah some serious names on the Super Rugby records. Most impressive record for me is Caleb Ralph playing in 104 consecutive games which meant not missing a game in 7 years. Not the most exciting player but you could plug him anywhere and he’d do a job.
@Eddie Hekenui: Cullen would have been my favourite on that list but ya, Ralph was lethal. Out and out finisher.
@Jim Demps: Oh yea in terms of players Ralph would be last on that list in terms of talent and how exciting he was. I just think not missing a game in 7 years is an incredible feat.
Cullen and Spencer were my two favourite players to watch growing up even as a die hard Crusaders fan. Two absolute mavericks capable of doing anything from anywhere on the pitch. You could help but love them. Spencer’s last try and conversion against the Crusaders back in 2004 is one of the most incredible things I’ve ever seen live.
@Eddie Hekenui
Never though Leo scored so many tries ::
he has been so successful
if the money was better and there was more interest maybe more AFL players might switch?