David Pocock will face his greatest challenge when he makes his comeback for the Brumbies against the NSW Waratahs in the Super Rugby game in Canberra on Saturday night. Yet Pocock’s test will not be his head-to-head clash with Waratahs openside flanker Michael Hooper or any other member of the NSW backrow, but the new ruck laws, which threaten to make breakdown specialists obsolete.

The best breakdown forward in world rugby, Pocock is the master of pilfering the ball at the tackle-contest, his enormous strength and low centre of gravity making him ideal for the task. But the new ruck laws make it harder for ball-scavengers to do their job by favouring the attacking team at the breakdown and thus reducing the contest for possession.

Pocock mastered the art of making the tackle, getting to his feet and immediately playing the ball but under the new laws the tackler must return to his own side and come through the “gate” before playing the ball. What’s more, as soon as an opposing player arrives at the ruck, hands cannot be used to get the ball. With the stroke of a pen law-makers may achieve what the world’s best backrowers have failed to do – stop Pocock at the breakdown.

New Zealand commentators have observed that former All Blacks captain and openside flanker Richie McCaw would have hated playing under the new ruck laws, which tells us something about the difficulty of the challenge facing Pocock. While he is not a noted ball-carrier, his superb defence, competitiveness and leadership qualities mean he is also not a one-trick pony, but if his main attribute is diminished, it has the potential to reduce his impact on the game.

It will be intriguing to see how Pocock adapts to the new laws and whether he can maintain his status as the most dominant player at the breakdown in the game. He does, however, have a couple of things in his favour. He is highly intelligent and would no doubt have studied the new ruck laws to figure out how he could remain as effective as before. He would have had a huge focus on this while training in the pre-season. Pocock has also had valuable experience playing under the new laws with Japanese club Panasonic Wild Knights in the Top League.

It might be asking a bit much of Pocock to have an immediate impact against the Waratahs regardless of the ruck laws. Apart from his stint in Japan Pocock has not played for over a year while on sabbatical. The standard of Japanese rugby has improved, particularly in relation to physicality, but it is not the same as Super Rugby. And Pocock’s return to Super Rugby has been delayed by a knee injury he sustained while playing for the Wild Knights in Japan.

Yet, the Brumbies will be relying on Pocock to re-assert his authority at the breakdown. Entering last weekend’s round, the Brumbies were averaging 4.5 turnovers won per game, which was the equal lowest in the competition along with the Crusaders. The Hurricanes were leading the competition in this area with 9.3 turnovers won per game, while the other Australian teams were all higher than the Brumbies – the Queensland Reds (nine), the Melbourne Rebels (8.3) and the Waratahs (7.8).

How Pocock copes with the new ruck laws will not just be important to the Brumbies, but to the Wallabies, who also rely heavily on his work at the breakdown. Australian rugby supporters will never forget Pocock’s heroics in the Wallabies’ gritty win against South Africa in the quarter-final of the 2011 World Cup when he won turnover after turnover in the team’s red zone to thwart the Springboks.

And the fact he won the most breakdown turnovers at the 2015 World Cup underlines his great value to the Wallabies. As a result, Rugby Australia rewarded Pocock handsomely while he was running around with lions and elephants on sabbatical in Africa to ensure he played at the 2019 World Cup in Japan, but now that investment is potentially at risk because of a change in the laws.

As a keen observer of African wildlife, Pocock will no doubt appreciate the Darwinian theory that the species that survives is the one that is best able to adapt to change.