'He's calm, I'm a maniac': How Cleary and Munster are gelling on and off field

Cameron Munster and Nathan Cleary are sharing a room in Edinburgh during a break from Kangaroos camp in an indication that Australia’s newest halves pairing are gelling away from the field as well as on it.

The pair played together for the first time in Australia’s 84-0 rout of Scotland in Coventry and while Munster said he had taken a backseat in the first half they laid on eight tries between them and Cleary scored another in a 28-point haul on debut for the Kangaroos.

Australian coach Mal Meninga, who must make the agonising choice between Cleary and Munster’s Queensland halves partner Daly Cherry-Evans for the halfback role, gave the squad three days off and most players headed to Edinburgh.

Among them were Cleary and Munster, who revealed that the pair were rooming together in the Scottish capital, despite describing their personalities by saying: “He’s calm and I’m a maniac”.

“I’m trying to give him a bit of stick to warm him up a little bit,” Munster said. “We’re actually rooming together in the next couple of days, playing golf on a little trip, so I’ll get him out of his shell.

“He’s a very calm, collected kid and nothing gets under his skin, but I’ll see what I can do.”

Munster, Cherry-Evans and the hooking duo of Ben Hunt and Harry Grant played together in this year’s Origin series win but Cleary has led Penrith to back-to-back premierships and is expected to be Australia’s long term halfback.

However, Meninga must decide whether to promote him to the role now or stick with a successful combination for the sudden death mode of the World Cup.

“Mal is going to have to sit down with us as a spine and decide pretty quickly who he wants to go with,” Munster said.

“We have Italy next week but looking further into the tournament we need to make sure we’ve got that spine cemented when we play the bigger games.

“They’re both quality halves, DCE and Nath, so I’d hate to be a selector or Mal at the moment. It’ll be interesting to see where Mal goes but whatever he decides I’ll jump on the back of and keep playing the consistent footy I have been.

“There’ll be a little bit of disappointment in one of those guy’s heads for sure because everyone wants to play for Australia, especially in the World Cup. But they’re both professional players so they’ll understand which way Mal wants to go.”

The Storm star played alongside Cherry-Evans in Australia’s opening match against Fiji and Cleary in the big win over Scotland but insisted he didn’t have a preferred halves partner.

Instead, Munster revealed how he had let Cleary run the show in his Test debut before stepping up his involvement in the second half.

Cleary produced three try assists and scored a try in the opening 30 minutes, while Munster finished the match with five try assists.

“It’s different to clubland when you’re trying to do everything you can to get around the ball," he said.

"When you’re playing for Australia you’ve got the best of the best, so sometimes you’ve got to take a backseat and let the boys do their thing. I did that for the first 30 but then decided to pull my finger out.

“For me personally, the way Nath plays, he’s good with structure and organising. I thought if I let him do his thing, it would be a lot more comfortable coming into his game.

 “If I took more of an ownership role, I thought he’d be more hesitant, so I let him do what he does and inject myself when I need to. I thought we gelled well.”