A code-hopping 21-year-old has announced himself as Australian Rugby’s newest star.

As the Wallabies downed England at Twickenham 42-37 for the first time at the iconic venue since the 2015 Rugby World Cup, Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii made a debut for the ages.

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It was the former Sydney Roosters and New South Wales State of Origin representative’s first game of rugby union since high school after he signed a lucrative $5.35 million deal over the next three seasons, but the 198cm centre showed few signs of rust.

Suaalii was in the thick of things from the opening kick off and his ability to get his arms free in tackles was a standout, which was best displayed by him setting up a first half try for Tom Wright with a one-handed, basketball-style, chest pass.

The Wallabies hyped up his debut massively in the lead-up to this game and their three-year signing of him is strategic with next year’s British and Irish Lions Tour and a home World Cup in 2027 on the horizon, and UK Telegraph’s senior rugby writer Charlie Morgan believes Australia has found its star attraction for those much-hyped events.

“Already, the investment seems promising. His presence alone will be enough to enliven the Lions series,” Morgan wrote.

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“Ominously for Andy Farrell (Lions Head Coach), he is likely to be much better by the time of that first Test on July 25 in Brisbane.

“Suaalii underlined that he is no luxury plaything. His was a performance of substance that married formidable athleticism and sleight of hand.”

Suaalii’s athletic ability is so impressive that Wallabies assistant coach Geoff Parling said during the week that he is “slightly rangier” than fellow code-hopper Israel Folau.

While Morgan drew comparison to another famous rugby union convert.

“As he settles in union and picks up more touches, team-mates will be rewarded for simply tracking him. The same was true for the All Blacks and Sonny Bill Williams,” Morgan wrote.

“Put simply, Suaalii makes things happen.”

Parling also told the media of how fascinating it is to watch Suaalii prepare as at training he will take time to walk around the pitch, visualise game-day scenarios and talk himself through how he will approach them.

The visualisation clearly paid off at the restarts as Wallabies coach Joe Schmidt labelled him “a bit of an aerial freak”.

Of the eight restarts Australia had across the 80 minutes, Suaalii helped win back possession in half of them – three of them were sent too long for him to compete.

It is a phenomenal strike rate, and it was symbolic of what the Wallabies have been crying out for in recent years with union slipping behind in the everlasting code wars.

“Australian rugby union fans have suffered for years of the nation’s top athletic talent being lured to rugby league or the AFL, tempted by the riches and ruder health of the competing codes,” the UK Independent’s Harry Latham-Coyle wrote.

“Now, though, union had pinched a princely talent of their own.”

Most impressively Suaalii seemed to take it all in his stride.

He was not overawed by the occasion, nor by the pressure of being arguably the Wallabies’ most high profile debutant since Folau.

The ABC’s Simon Smale identified that there was only a brief moment pre-game where Suaalii’s steely focus was broken to soak up the atmosphere of the 82,000-seat stadium he was about to light up.

“A sly grin escaped onto the youngsters face, a little sneaky acceptance of the task that he was about to undertake, an acknowledgment that he was where he has always wanted to be,” Smale wrote.

Unlike other code hoppers, Suaalii grew up playing rugby union as a child, always loved the sport and comes from a family passionate about it.

That grounding in the 15 a side game makes him a different product to others who have followed the same path, and Smale insisted that he should not be lumped in the same category as them.

“But don’t let Suaalii’s birth date fool you into thinking he’s a raw, impressionable, Gen Z-er, flip flopping between codes with an airy lack of commitment to either,” he wrote.

“Suaalii is exactly where the Wallabies need him to be.

“It is to their immense fortune, that it’s where he wants to be too.”